El Deal gets class test in Gold Fever
There are $100,000 stakes early and late on the Friday card at Belmont Park.
In the third race, the six-furlong Gold Fever for 3-year-olds, El Deal will try to improve his record to 4 for 4. Race 8 is the License Fee, a wide-open six-furlong turf sprint for fillies and mares.
El Deal has looked like the real deal in his first three starts but will be taking a substantial jump in class. El Deal won his debut in a $30,000 maiden-claiming sprint. That race made him eligible for a starter allowance, which he won by eight lengths. He then took a road trip to Parx Racing, where he won a first-level allowance.
The Gold Fever will not only be El Deal’s stakes debut, it will be former rider Andrew Lakeman’s stakes debut as a trainer.
“He’s coming along great,” Lakeman said. “He’s pretty versatile. He has a lot of speed, but he’s also pretty easy to take off the pace. He’s an easy horse to train, and I think he has room to improve.”
The 90 Beyer Speed Figure that El Deal earned in his starter-allowance win is the highest of anyone in the five-horse field. The horse he beat in that race, Whateveryouwant, came back to win a first-level optional claimer as the favorite in his next start.
Nonna’s Boy will keep El Deal honest. In three starts as a 2-year-old, he won a Belmont Park maiden race and at Saratoga was fourth, beaten two lengths, in the Sanford and seventh in the Saratoga Special. He was sharp in winning his April 3 comeback, a first-level allowance at Pimlico.
Ackeret ran much better than his running line looks in the April 4 Bay Shore Stakes. He was moving up the rail to challenge for the lead in midstretch when the hole he was moving through closed and he lost his chance. He may not have won that race, but he would have been much closer than his seventh-place finish indicates.
License Fee: Believe in Charlie may be quickest
In six of her last seven starts, Believe in Charlie has raced against Free as a Bird, one of the top female turf sprinters in the country. Free as a Bird won five of those races and finished second in the other.
Believe in Charlie might have the best early speed in the License Fee, and, for once, she won’t have to face Free as a Bird.
“Free as a Bird is an awesome filly, and we would have faced her at Keeneland, too, but I scratched because of the soft turf,” trainer Tom Bush said of the Giant’s Causeway Stakes. “This is definitely a better spot, and even though her best races have been on the lead, she really doesn’t need to be in front.”
Bush described Believe in Charlie as a “lovely filly who is aggressive in her gallops and who puts a lot of work into her training.” The plan, he said, is to race her this year before owner Westbury Stables breeds her next year at 6.
Christophe Clement has entered two in the License Fee. Annecdote, the winner of the Grade 3 Noble Damsel in her U.S. debut last September, will be shortening up in distance, while Zindaya, the most lightly raced runner in the field, might prove to be Believe in Charlie’s main pace challenger.
Trainer Michael Matz has entered Tea Time, who will be making her first start since August. Tea Time, a talented 3-year-old sprinter last season, will be making her turf debut.