First Premio comes off win in similar conditions
RACE REPLAY IS NOT AVAILABLE
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Back-to-back allowances with maximum purses of $104,000 are the anchors of a special Memorial Day card Monday at Churchill Downs.
The co-features go as races 7 and 8 on a nine-race program and therefore are key links in all the late multi-race wagers, including a 20-cent Derby City 6 (races 4-9) that had its jackpot emptied Saturday by forceout. Both are second-level allowances.
Race 7 drew an oversubscribed lineup of older horses going 1 1/16 miles on the turf. First Premio is a deserving morning-line favorite, considering he was a sharp winner under similar conditions on the May 1 Kentucky Derby undercard. Trainer Mark Casse has taken advantage of the race conditions by entering the 7-year-old gelding for an optional $62,500 tag, and a repeat try would make the chestnut gelding a tough customer here. Brian Hernandez Jr. assumes the mount in place of Umberto Rispoli, who was at Churchill only for Derby week.
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Street Ready, equipped with blinkers for the first time, is among the chief threats if First Premio can’t duplicate his last effort, along with Vintage Print, who was a decent sixth in the same Derby Day race when making his first start in more than nine months.
In all, 12 are entered, but only as many as eight can start, assuming the race stays on the grass as expected.
Race 8 got a field of six 3-year-old fillies going six furlongs, with Farsighted, Gulf Coast, and Li’l Tootsie all exiting stakes and dipping down into the allowance ranks. It’s probably worth noting that Farsighted will be treated with the bleeder medication Lasix after beating a steady fade in the Grade 3 Beaumont on opening day of the Keeneland spring meet in her most recent appearance.
Novel Squall and Big Time, two of the longer shots in the cast, are entered for a $100,000 optional claiming tag.
Listed purses for all non-claiming/starter races at Churchill include sizable supplements restricted to horses registered to the Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund. As an example, KTDF bonuses for each of the co-features total $39,200.
First post is 12:45 p.m. Eastern for the only Monday card of a 38-day spring meet that runs through June 26. Mostly sunny skies and a high of 75 are in the holiday forecast.
After two dark days, a regular four-day week resumes Thursday with twilight racing.
◗ With a huge Belmont Stakes card being the main attraction for fans here and elsewhere, the weekend highlight at Churchill is the Mighty Beau, a $110,000 overnight stakes for 3-year-old and up turf sprinters on Saturday. The next graded stakes is the Grade 3 Mint Julep on June 12.