Cox shippers look strong in Goldfinch, Golden Circle
Eclipse Award-winning training Brad Cox might not be running anything in the Preakness, but he has two stakes starters Saturday at Prairie Meadows.
Inject goes in the $50,000 Goldfinch Stakes, while Vulcan runs in the $50,000 Golden Circle. Both races are carded for six furlongs and restricted to 3-year-olds, while the Goldfinch has a further restriction, with only fillies permitted to start. Has the local morning line-maker heard of this Cox fellow? Unclear. Vulcan is listed as an 8-1 shot in the Golden Circle, Inject at 6-1 in the Goldfinch. The Golden Circle, to be fair, boasts quite a deep field for a $50,000 race, but Inject (cross-entered at Pimlico but, Cox said in a text message Thursday, bound for Prairie Meadows) surely will be a far shorter price.
Inject is one of 10 fillies in the Goldfinch and should vie for favoritism. Trained at age 2 by Stanley Hough, Inject ran poorly last fall in her lone stakes try but comes into this start off a game first-level allowance win in a Keeneland dirt sprint, where she was up by a neck over Mischiefful, who in her previous start had scored a sharp Gulfstream Park maiden win. That performance produced an 89 Beyer Speed Figure, Inject’s top number and easily the best in this field. Inject, from Frosted’s first crop as a stallion, also has an 82 from her career debut last August to validate the recent figure.
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Goldfinch entrants Heart Full of Soul, Becca’s Rocket, and Miss Twenty finished first, second, and third, respectively, in a second-level allowance race April 23 at Oaklawn, but while Heart Full of Soul possesses the most upside among the trio, all three rallied from well off the pace in a fast-paced race dominated by closers.
Feeling Mischief, in from Chicago for trainer Mike Campbell, won the Dec. 5 Sandpiper at Tampa Bay in her most recent six-furlong start over a fast track. The Steve Asmussen-trained Canadian-bred Kandy Ginger went 3 for 3 at age 2 and will make her first start since beating Miss Twenty in a Remington Park stakes on Sept. 27.
Asmussen appears to have a major player for the Golden Circle in Bloom Racing’s Molto Vivace, who debuted Feb. 4 at Fair Grounds before turning in three solid showings at Oaklawn, where he notched a second-start maiden win and beat first-level allowance foes April 16 in his most recent appearance.
Among the other eight entrants are the one-two finishers from last August’s Prairie Gold Juvenile, where Bodenheimer eked out a neck win over Scars Are Cool. Victory aside, Bodenheimer clearly took a step back that day from his Canterbury Park debut win on turf, and Bodenheimer’s next five races came on grass. Winner of the Indian Summer Stakes last fall at Keeneland, Bodenheimer just raced April 24 at Churchill, finishing a close second in the William Walker Stakes, run down late by the Cox-trained Field Day.
Now, the rival from the Cox barn is Vulcan, unraced since finishing second in the Kip Deville on Sept. 27 at Remington. Vulcan shows fast recent works at Indiana Grand. Regardless of the layoff, he likely ships west ready for something decent in his 3-year-old debut.