Desert Code favorites would both like to stalk and pounce

The $100,000 Desert Code Stakes for 3-year-olds turf sprinters at Santa Anita on Sunday is as much a prep to a popular summer race as it is a chance for a $60,000 first-place purse this weekend.

The Desert Code, run at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course, could easily produce starters for the $100,000 Oceanside Stakes at a mile on turf at Del Mar on the track’s opening day, July 20.

The Oceanside is clearly in the mindset of the partnership that owns race favorite King of Gosford, who won his stakes debut in the John Shear Stakes for 3-year-olds on the hillside turf course on April 7.

“We’ll probably look to stretch him out after this,” trainer Phil D’Amato said Friday.

D’Amato’s thoughts were echoed by trainer Doug O’Neill, who runs Guy Named Joe, the second-place finisher by a head in the Pasadena Stakes at a mile on turf in his last start in California on March 16.

O’Neill said the Oceanside is “100 percent” in his thoughts.

The immediate goal is a win on Sunday, and the focus will be on King of Gosford, who is unbeaten in two starts in this country for Sandra Benowitz, John Rochfort, Michael Nentwig, Saul Gevertz, and Jeremy Peskoff.

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A winner once in six starts in Ireland last year, King of Gosford began his American career with a win in an allowance race at six furlongs on turf at Santa Anita on March 10.

In the allowance race and the John Shear, King of Gosford was always near the front before taking the lead in early stretch. In the Desert Code, King of Gosford may track expected early leader All That Glory, who won a maiden race at six furlongs on turf from the front on May 5.

“I think he’s very tactical,” D’Amato said of King of Gosford. “He’s been on the lead the last two times by circumstances.

“In the mornings, I set him behind horses and he comes and gets them pretty easily. I can see us employing more of that.”

Antonio Fresu, who was aboard King of Gosford for his two local wins, has the mount.

Guy Named Joe won a maiden race at a mile on turf last December, and has been beaten in three stakes this year, including a third in the El Camino Real Derby on the synthetic main track at Golden Gate Fields in February and an eighth-place finish by 2 3/4 lengths in the Grade 3 Transylvania Stakes for 3-year-olds at 1 1/16 miles on turf at Keeneland on April 5.

Guy Named Joe was fitted with blinkers for the Pasadena and Transylvania, which O’Neill said has helped the colt to focus.

“He can win,” O’Neill said. “He’s been showing more interest early in the race.

“Hopefully, shortening up would be what we’re looking for. If he has something he can track, it would do him some good.”

The Desert Code will be the turf debut for Wynstock, who won the Grade 2 Los Alamitos Futurity on dirt last December, but was well beaten in the Grade 3 Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn Park in February and the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby last month.

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