Despite a loose shoe, Ain't Easy blows 'em away in Chandelier Stakes

ARCADIA, Calif. - Ain’t Easy tried to put her best foot forward on Friday at Santa Anita. She won in a romp in the Grade 2 Chandelier. Imagine what she could do with all her shoes properly affixed.

Ain’t Easy crossed the wire 4 3/4 lengths in front of the nearest of her six rivals in the $201,000 race for 2-year-old fillies, and returned with her left front shoe askew. Her trainer, Phil D’Amato, made sure to instruct his employees to get it pulled at the test barn, by which time some of her rivals might have caught up to her.

They couldn’t in the 1:45.20 it took Ain’t Easy ($9), the second choice, to win the 1 1/16-mile Chandelier, run over a fast but very dull surface on opening day of the track’s fall meeting. Ain’t Easy stalked the pace (23.56, 47.99) of Electric Ride, came through inside her heading to the three-furlong pole, extended her margin moving around the bend and into the lane, and was never threatened thereafter.

Electric Ride held second by 1 1/4 lengths over Desert Dawn. Censorship was fourth, then came, in order, Grace Adler, Dance to the Music, and Elm Drive.

The last three were first, second, and seventh in the Del Mar Debutante on Sept. 5, a race that unfolded with a fast pace that flattered Grace Adler. She got no such help on Friday and never was a factor at any point as the 9-10 favorite.

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Ain’t Easy, by Into Mischief, won her lone prior start, sprinting at Del Mar, with Joel Rosario, who made sure to head back out here for the Chandelier.

“She acted very professional, sitting behind,” D’Amato said. “She came up inside, which you like to see with a young horse.”

Ain’t Easy, owned by Old Bones Racing Stable, Michael Lombardi, and Joey Platts, was purchased as a yearling for $400,000.

She will make her next start Nov. 5 at Del Mar in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies, for which she earned a fees-paid berth with her win on Chandelier. She’ll need new shoes, but with the $120,000 she won Friday, it’s easily affordable.