Del Mar Babies for Thursday, Aug. 21

Race 5

Maiden special weight
2-year-old California-bred fillies
Six furlongs, Polytrack
Purse: $75,000

Key Contenders

9) Stormy Adieu

This daughter of Silic ran very well in her debut at Arlington Park on July 31, and any sort of progression here would put here in a different area code than most of these fillies. She’ll be dropping from open maiden special weight company into statebred maiden special weight company today. She will likely be much shorter than her 5-2 morning line suggests, but make no mistake about it – this race begins and ends with her.

FORMULATOR FACT: Trainer Ingrid Mason is 37 for 145 (87 in the money) over the past two years with horses entered in synthetic sprints.

10) Appealing Lady

This John Sadler trainee went off favored in her debut here on July 26 and proceeded to run rather evenly. She’s very likely to take a step forward for connections that are more than capable of having horses ready to improve in their second career starts. Rafael Bejarano retains the mount after that less-than-stellar debut performance, which can likely be viewed as a positive.

FORMULATOR FACT: Sadler is 11 for 29 (21 ITM, $2.22 return on investment) over the past five years with 2-year-old second time starters at Del Mar.

5) Ashley’s Sassy

Ashley’s Sassy exits the same race that Appealing Lady comes out of, and she actually outran Appealing Lady that day. This daughter of Decarchy has registered only one work since that effort on July 26, but it was encouraging to see her run the way she did in her debut. There’s a decent chance she’ll work out a trip from the middle of the pack, and she’d likely benefit from a speed duel.

FORMULATOR FACT: Trainer Peter Eurton is 3 for 11 (6 ITM) over the past five years with second-time-starting 2-year-olds running on synthetics.

The strategy

I believe Stormy Adieu is a very likely standout – which is both good and bad. It’s good that she can be used as a single in the payoff leg of a pick fives, but unless you’re okay backing horses that are likely to go off well below 2-1, she’s not going to offer any value. In this situation I’ll key her on top in exactas and trifectas with the other two fillies previously mentioned. Here are the plays:

EXACTAS of 9 / 5,10
TRIFECTAS of 9 / 5,10 / ALL
TRIFECTAS of 9 / ALL / 5,10