Del Mar Babies for Sunday, Aug. 17
Race 6
Maiden special weight
2-year-old colts, geldings, and ridglings
6 furlongs, Polytrack
Purse: $75,000
Key contenders
4) Zinvor – Zinvor has run two reasonably solid races in his career, and today, he’ll sport blinkers for the first time. The progression on the Beyer Speed Figure scale from start one to start two is something that is encouraging and that you like to see from young horses, and you’d have to expect the addition of blinkers would keep him involved in the running a bit earlier than usual. He’ll go out for trainer Adam Kitchingman with rider Kent Desormeaux aboard.
DRF Formulator Fact: Trainer Adam Kitchingman is 2 for 10 (3 ITM, $4.15 ROI) over the past year with 2-year-olds equipped with blinkers for the first time.
8) Noble Hawk – Noble Hawk will be making his second start off the layoff for trainer Ed Moger Jr. here, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see this son of Decarchy take a step forward. Here’s another 2-year-old who took a solid step forward on the Beyer Speed Figure scale from start one to start two, and with a bit more racing luck, he could very well be on his way toward graduation. Racing experience is always key with young 2-year-olds, and that could very well make the difference for this guy.
DRF Formulator Fact: Trainer Ed Moger Jr. is 8 for 42 over the past year with horses making their second start off a layoff in sprints.
3) Lucky Mark – Trainer Martin Jones doesn’t do very well with juveniles overall, but this son of Lucky Pulpit has been training forwardly recently, and he appears ready to fire at first asking. It’s always preferable to see any first-time starter get acclimated to the surface on which they’ll be running, but the four-furlong bullet from the gate Aug. 8 at Los Alamitos should relieve a bit of that trepidation. It’s also worth noting the presence of jockey Joe Talamo here for this guy’s unveiling, something that must be viewed as a positive.
DRF Formulator Fact: Sire Lucky Pulpit’s juveniles have gone 17 for 87 (22 percent) over the past five years in synthetic sprints.
The strategy
I truly don’t love anyone in this field, but if I were forced to play a horse to win it would be the Kitchingman trainee Zinvor. I believe he has the class edge over the field and projects to work out a reasonable trip with the addition of the blinkers. Again – it’s not a race I’m salivating to play, but I’d pick Zinvor if I were forced to play the race.