Candy Caballo realistically spotted but may need a race

At some point this year, Tom Wenzel is likely to break his 67-win tie with Doris Harwood for most all-time stakes victories by a trainer at Emerald Downs. How Candy Caballo fares in Saturday’s featured sixth race will likely determine whether he’ll be among the Wenzel trainees who have a chance to make history on June 21, when the first four stakes of the meet will be run.

Candy Caballo is 2 for 10 lifetime and still in search of his first stakes win. He was stakes-placed twice last year in $50,000 sprints for 3-year-olds, finishing behind Si That Tiger each time. He then finished a distant sixth in the 1 1/16-mile Muckleshoot Derby on Aug. 17.

“He tried Si That Tiger at least three times and he couldn’t outrun that horse last year,” Wenzel said. “He’s a nice little colt, but he could be a cut below the best.”

Despite going winless in a trio of routes, Wenzel isn’t quite willing to rule out longer races for his colt. But, to date, he’s been undeniably better sprinting, which he’ll get to do over 5 1/2 furlongs on Saturday in a well-matched field of seven.

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Candy Caballo hasn’t raced since the Muckleshoot Derby. Wenzel planned to race him over the winter, “but a few things happened and he never got started in California,” the trainer said.

Instead, he’ll try to fire ultra-fresh, a scenario that doesn’t inspire a ton of faith from his trainer.

“My confidence level is probably in the medium range,” Wenzel said. “He’s trained fine. Maybe it takes a race for him to be at his best.”

Wenzel admits he hasn’t “totally figured out” what Candy Caballo’s best running style is, though he suspects “it might just be off the pace.” There should be plenty of pace in this race with a pair of veteran Blaine Wright trainees, Elder Mack and Tax Code, breaking from the far inside and outside, respectively.

If those two, along with another front-runner, Adios Jojo, tax themselves up front, Veritas Aequitas has the tactical speed to worm his way into the winner’s circle. But like Wenzel, trainer Dan Markle is keeping expectations modest after a fall and winter in Southern California, where the 5-year-old gelding “didn’t accomplish much.”

“I probably don’t have the throttle drawn back as far as I should for this race,” said Markle, who expects Veritas Aequitas to hang back and save ground in the early going. “I expect him to run pretty hard. The speed on the inside is the one to catch at this distance, and the horse on the outside has a great record here. A lot has to happen in our favor. He’s gonna have to sprout wings at the three-eighths pole.”

◗ Speaking of training milestones, Tim McCanna became only the second trainer in Emerald Downs history to notch 1,000 wins at the track last Sunday when jockey Karlo Lopez piloted first-time starter Janey to victory. Frank Lucarelli is Emerald Downs’s winningest trainer with 1,197 local victories.

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