Bulletin tops crowded Palisades Turf Sprint
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Keeneland fans won’t have to wait long to see their first Breeders’ Cup winner at the spring meet. Bulletin will make his first start since capturing the BC Juvenile Turf Sprint last fall at Churchill Downs on Thursday in the opening-day feature, the $100,000 Palisades Turf Sprint.
Owned by a partnership led by WinStar Farm, Bulletin has been on a steady work schedule for trainer Todd Pletcher since late January at Palm Beach Downs in South Florida, with his eighth breeze coming last Wednesday. The City Zip colt surely will be favored when he breaks from post 12 in a field of 14 3-year-olds in the 5 1/2-furlong Palisades, the seventh of eight Thursday races. Javier Castellano has a return call.
Pletcher thought so highly of Bulletin after watching the colt train at Saratoga last summer that he sent him – unraced – to Gulfstream Park to run in the Hollywood Beach in late September. Bulletin responded with a seven-length romp, an effort so eye-catching that he was the 4-1 second choice in a field of 12 in his lone subsequent start, the inaugural BC Juvenile Turf Sprint on Nov. 2. Always on the lead, Bulletin dismissed a sustained bid from longshot Chelsea Cloisters inside the furlong pole to win going away by 2 3/4 lengths.
Five months later, while Bulletin has trained right along, some of his contemporaries have seized the opportunity to mature and improve through racing – so it’s conceivable that the disparity between Bulletin and the rest might not be as glaring as it once was.
One of those trying to close that gap is Real News (post 6, Joel Rosario). The son of The Factor also is 2 for 2, albeit in a far more conventional way than Bulletin, having won a maiden race and first-level allowance at the recently concluded Fair Grounds meet for trainer Al Stall Jr. His latest win on March 8 came in the final jump, as he somehow overcame being boxed in for much of the stretch run by making up several lengths in the final 100 yards.
“Hooking a Breeders’ Cup winner isn’t your everyday horse race,” said Stall. “But this colt really showed something with the way he closed in his last one. This race fits our schedule, it’s on our circuit, and it’s where we’re going, regardless of who else is in there.”
Mark Casse and Wesley Ward, both of whom will be very active throughout the meet, both have three starters. Casse will send out Yes I Am Free, Strike Silver, and Dom Carlos, while Ward counters with Hawaiian Noises, Abyssinian, and Chelsea Cloisters.
Special first post Thursday is 3 p.m. Eastern, with the Palisades set for about 6:15. First post for all remaining days is 1:05.
