Excellent Choice leads sprint field

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Excellent Choice, a nominee to Sunday's Ontario Colleen Handicap, is among the five fillies and mares in Wednesday's $67,600 Woodbine feature, a $62,500 optional claimer.

Also entered in the seven-furlong race are Roman Romance, Amy's Falcon, Regalclass, and Plunderthepeasants.

Excellent Choice spent the winter and early spring in Florida, with trainer Frank Gomez, where she competed with mixed success. She captured an entry-level allowance by a widening eight lengths on Nov. 11 at Calder, but perhaps the best effort of her 15-race career was a fourth-place finish in the Old Hat Stakes at Gulfstream on Jan. 6.

Excellent Choice was sent here in the spring to trainer Mike Doyle, who ran her in a $62,500 optional claimer on July 7. She was blocked briefly in the stretch of that six-furlong dash before closing to finish just a neck back of Crumpet and Screen Happy in third.

Excellent Choice moved up in company to test classified allowance opponents most recently July 27, and checked in third, earning a Beyer Speed Figure of 77.

Emile Ramsammy replaces the suspended Chantal Sutherland aboard Excellent Choice, who is owned by William Murphy.

Regalclass, trained by Mike DePaulo, has knocked heads with talented runners like Sheila's Prospect, Gorilla My Dreams, and Lightning Pace in her last three appearances. She is winless on the year, but has hit the board in each of her last four starts, and was only beaten a length in a recent seven-furlong jaunt at this level.

Robert Landry will ride Regalclass, who finished second in the 2000 Lady Angela Stakes.

Amy's Falcon has stuck to the turf since finishing well back in her first two outings of the year on the main track, the surface over which she won 2 of 4 starts at 2. Trained by Tom Bowden, she was a prominent second in her first grass try in the June 1 Alywow Stakes, but has failed to duplicate that feat in three subsequent starts in allowance/optional claimers.

Roman Romance, stabled at Fort Erie with trainer John Simms, led throughout a preliminary allowance for Ontario-sired runners here May 3. She then captured a $50,000 optional claimer over a sloppy track at Fort Erie, and was recently third while experimenting around two turns in the restricted Lauries Dancer Stakes.

Plunderthepeasants is running at her fifth different track in her fifth start of the year. She was second earlier this month in a $40,000 optional claimer at her Fort Erie base for trainer Nick Gonzalez.