Faithfully eyes payday in Beholder Mile due to short field

ARCADIA, Calif. – With the chance for a placing in a Grade 1 race and at least $24,000 in prize money, Faithfully might start in a short field in Saturday’s $400,000 Beholder Mile at Santa Anita.

As of Monday, the Beholder Mile for fillies and mares had three probable starters – the champions Finest City and Stellar Wind, and Vale Dori, who has won six consecutive starts since October.

Bob Baffert trains Vale Dori, who worked five furlongs in 59.60 seconds at Santa Anita on Monday. Baffert timed her through a half-mile in 47 seconds.

Baffert also trains Faithfully, a two-time winner who has never raced in a stakes. The opportunity to start her in a lucrative race appealed to Baffert on Monday. The race pays $240,000 to first, $80,000 to second, $48,000 to third, $24,000 to fourth, and $8,000 to fifth, if there are five runners.

“Maybe I’ll enter,” he said.

Stellar Wind, the champion 3-year-old filly of 2015; Finest City, the champion female sprinter of 2016; and the red-hot Vale Dori have scared away most candidates. Songbird, the two-time champion who has not raced since a second in the Breeders’ Cup Distaff, is bound for the Grade 1 Ogden Phipps Stakes at Belmont Park on June 10.

The Beholder Mile drew only seven nominees. Sensitively and Show Stealer were nominated but are more likely to run in the $75,000 Santa Lucia Stakes, a restricted stakes for fillies and mares at 1 1/16 miles on Sunday.

Horses can be supplemented to the Beholder Mile for $8,000 when entries are taken Wednesday.

The Beholder Mile is one of two Grade 1 races worth $400,000 on Saturday. There are no shortage of candidates for the other one, the Shoemaker Mile on turf. The race had eight probable starters as of Monday – Bal a Bali, Bolo, Farhaan, Free Rose, Gangster, Heart to Heart, Perfectly Majestic, and What a View

Farhaan, the winner of the Grade 3 Thunder Road Stakes at a mile on turf here April 29, will be ridden by Flavien Prat, a replacement for Tyler Baze, who is booked to ride What a View.

What a View won the Crystal Water Stakes for California-breds at a mile on turf May 20.

The winner of the Shoemaker Mile receives a fees-paid berth to the Breeders’ Cup Mile at Del Mar on Nov. 4, provided he is nominated to the Breeders’ Cup program. Of the probable starters, only Heart to Heart is not nominated to the Breeders’ Cup program.

Prospect Park and Mr. Roary were nominated to the Shoemaker Mile but will not run.

Prospect Park, third in the Grade 2 Californian Stakes on April 22, is out of training after undergoing surgery in mid-May to have a bone chip removed from an ankle, trainer Clifford Sise said. Prospect Park won the Grade 3 La Jolla Handicap on turf at Del Mar in August 2015.

Mr. Roary, eighth in the Grade 2 Twilight Derby last November in his most recent start, is likely to have his 2017 debut in an allowance race, trainer George Papaprodromou said.