Calder: Red Brunette gets stakes test in Cut the Charm

MIAMI – Manny Tortora has won more than 2,000 races since Calder first opened its doors in 1971, making him far and away the winningest trainer in the history of the track. He has won 11 Florida Stallion Stakes races, including all three legs of the open division in 1994 with two different horses, Mecke and Sea Emperor, and became one of the first trainers to be inducted in the Calder Hall of Fame three years later.

But for all his success, Tortora has not had a top juvenile in several years. His last Stallion Stakes victory came in the 2009 Desert Vixen with Sweetatabye. He does, however, have the makings of a top-caliber 2-year-old on his hands this fall – the speedy Red Brunette, who may go postward the favorite in the Cut the Charm Stakes, one of two $50,000 juvenile stakes at Calder on Saturday.

The Cut the Charm drew a full field of a dozen juvenile fillies, in sharp contrast to the open Excellent Luck, which lured only seven 2-year-olds, led by a couple of Bluegrass Cat offspring, the multiple winner Bluegrass Derby and likely favorite Elusive Blueboy.

Red Brunette launched her career under a $40,000 claiming tag last month at Gulfstream Park and proved too fast for her eight rivals, leading from start to finish under jockey Jocy Gomez to register a 3 1/4-length victory. Red Brunette earned a 70 Beyer Speed Figure, the highest last-race Beyer of any member of the Cut the Charm Field. She tuned up for Saturday’s assignment by working a sizzling half-mile in 46.20 with Gomez aboard at Gulfstream on Monday.

Red Brunette isn’t the only member of the Cut the Charm field with a high turn of foot. City in Sky opened her career with a pair of wire-to-wire victories before failing to carry her speed in two subsequent stakes starts, including a distant third-place finish in the Cassidy on Sept. 28.

City in Sky is one of only two multiple winners in the Cut the Charm lineup along with Scipture ’n Verse, who was claimed for $16,000 out of her maiden win Aug. 25 and exits a hard-fought three-quarter-length triumph over $40,000 starter allowance foes going six furlongs at Calder on Oct. 27.

Kentucky invader Side Street makes her local debut for trainer Liz Gray. Side Street won a maiden race in September, despite being hung wide in a full and very strong field at Churchill Downs.

Bluegrass Derby is one of three Kentucky-breds in the Excellent Luck. He has been freshened since finishing a non-threatening sixth in the six-furlong Birdonthewire here Sept. 28. Bluegrass Derby had won two of his three previous starts, including an allowance dash in gate-to-wire fashion at Gulfstream late this summer.

Trainer Ralph Nicks got away with running Elusive Blueboy under a $32,000 claiming tag when the colt launched his career at Gulfstream on Aug. 17. The speedy youngster overcame an awkward start to post a 10-length victory. Elusive Blueboy returned eight weeks later to finish second behind the odds-on Wildcat Red after setting the pace to late stretch under entry-level allowance conditions and may be the one to catch again in the Excellent Luck.