Bond Market's stock on the rise headed into Lake Ontario
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ETOBICOKE, Ontario – The Canadian bond market has been somewhat stagnant, but the equine Bond Market’s stock has been rising with every start. The handsome chestnut should be favored in Sunday’s $150,000 Lake Ontario, one of two 1 1/16-mile stakes for Ontario-sired 3-year-olds on the Woodbine card, along with the $150,000 Ashbridges Bay for fillies.
Trained by Carlos Grant for owner/breeder Brian O’Leary, Bond Market wasted no time earning his diploma, winning a one-mile maiden special on the inner turf at first asking July 5. He went straight to the $1 million King’s Plate about five weeks later and finished a creditable sixth after a troubled start that saw him much farther back than anticipated.
“He got in a lot of trouble in the Plate,” Grant recalled. “He got struck in the face when he came out of the gate and went right. Then, he was way out of it and came on and beat half the field. That was a very good performance.”
Bond Market made his next start going 1 1/2 miles in the anchor leg of the Canadian Triple Crown, the $500,000 Breeders’ Stakes, during which he rallied inside for second behind Fire and Wine, who returned to take the Grade 3 Ontario Derby. He was a winning favorite in a 1 3/8-mile allowance on the inner turf most recently, while earning his third straight 82 Beyer Speed Figure.
Grant has been pointing Bond Market to the Lake Ontario and said he might run him back against older Ontario-sired stock Dec. 6 in the $150,000 Steady Growth Stakes. He has no qualms with racing the son of Bond Street, himself a son of the great Galileo, a second time on the Tapeta.
“He’s versatile enough,” Grant said. “He trains well on the Tapeta. He’s doing very well.”
Among the others in the seven-horse field are Plate Trial runner-up Imyourmedicineman, who ran in all three legs of the Triple Crown before capturing an allowance, and the stakes-winning sprinter My Covenant.
Ashbridges Bay
The late bloomer Going Platinum meets Regal Affair and four others in the Ashbridges Bay.
Trained by Rachel Halden, Going Platinum is making her stakes debut off a second after setting the pace in an Ontario-sired allowance which she lost by just a head on the main turf. The half-sister to 2023 King’s Plate victor Paramount Prince was previously a gate-to-wire winner over Ontario-sired maidens on the inner turf.
Regal Affair has been a productive closing sprinter for trainer Steve Attard. She took the Rondeau Bay Stakes three back on the dirt at Fort Erie and is coming off a third in a seven-furlong Ontario-sired allowance, both under Pietro Moran. She ran third in her lone 1 1/16-mile start against nonwinners-of-two allowance company in July.
“The mile and a sixteenth is somewhat questionable, but I think she’ll go [the distance], especially with Pietro on her,” Attard said. “Her last race going seven-eighths, she was closing ground, so we’re pretty confident.”
Money Heist wired Ontario-sired maidens going seven furlongs in her latest and could hook up on the lead with Going Platinum.
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