Chancery Way to take another swing at Solana Beach Stakes
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The five-time stakes winner Chancery Way will be sent from Northern California to Del Mar next month in search of an elusive goal – a stakes win at a mile.
Chancery Way has developed a niche in minor stakes or California-bred stakes in the last two years, winning five sprints at Del Mar, Golden Gate Fields, Pleasanton, and Sacramento.
The most recent of those was a commanding 3 1/2-length win in the $66,250 Governor’s Cup Stakes for fillies and mares at six furlongs at Cal-Expo in Sacramento on Saturday evening, a win that ended a three-race losing streak.
The 5-year-old mare’s next objective is the $150,000 Solana Beach Stakes at a mile on turf for statebred fillies and mares at Del Mar on Aug. 18. Chancery Way was third by 1 1/4 lengths in the Solana Beach last year.
“She wasn’t disgraced,” trainer Jamey Thomas said. “She only got beat a head for second.”
Thomas said on Sunday that he is eager to try a slightly older Chancery Way again at a mile, and that the result may be different this year.
“I think she relaxes better now than she had been,” he said.
Chancery Way, who races for Andy and Rob Smolich, has won 8 of 16 starts and earned $415,020. She won her last start at Del Mar, the Betty Grable Stakes for statebred fillies and mares at seven furlongs last November.
The win in the Governor’s Cup reversed a disappointing third in the Pleasanton Oaks at six furlongs in June, Chancery Way’s first start since a game second in the Irish O’Brien Stakes on the hillside turf course at Santa Anita in March.
Thomas said Chancery Way needed the start at Pleasanton. He said she was not aggressively trained in late May and early June when based at Golden Gate Fields, which closed permanently in early June. Thomas said he was dissatisfied with the condition of the synthetic main track at Golden Gate Fields, and waited until Chancery Way was moved to Pleasanton before intensifying her exercise.
“She was getting a little bit sore, enough to think you better back off,” he said. “We backed off until we got to Pleasanton.”
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