Game Winner enters Los Al Derby feeling recharged

The first half of 2019 did not go according to plan for California racing or Game Winner.

Industry headwinds continue, but Game Winner weathered the storm, and bullish trainer Bob Baffert believes the colt will make a splash in the second half. Though he did not run poorly in three starts this year, Game Winner is winless at 3 after having gone undefeated at 2.

“I thought he was the best 3-year-old [at the start of the year],” Baffert said. “You can think you have the best, but the horse has to go out and prove it. He has to do it.”

Game Winner’s redemption begins Saturday in the Grade 3 Los Alamitos Derby. Last year’s champion juvenile male, he is the 1-5 favorite against three rivals in the 1 1/8-mile race, his first start since a wide-trip sixth (placed fifth) in the Kentucky Derby.

He returns with a new attitude and blinkers, and training as if the season is just now starting. Game Winner’s rivals are the front-running stablemate Kingly, improving California-bred allowance winner Feeling Strong, and stakes-placed maiden Parsimony.

The $150,000 race is an ideal comeback for Game Winner, owned by Gary and Mary West. Joel Rosario retains the mount in a race designed to prepare Game Winner for the Grade 1 Travers on Aug. 24 at Saratoga. After a frustrating first half of 2019, Saturday marks a new beginning.

“What was frustrating was when they closed the track here,” Baffert said this week at Santa Anita, where Game Winner trains. Santa Anita suspended racing in March and canceled the Grade 2 San Felipe Stakes, which was Game Winner’s scheduled comeback race after winning the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.

“The whole plan was to run him here,” Baffert said. Instead, Game Winner shipped to Oaklawn Park for the Grade 2 Rebel Stakes, which he lost by a nose to Omaha Beach. That was followed by a wide-trip runner-up finish April 6 in the Santa Anita Derby.

“I took him to Oaklawn, and he ran really hard, then he ran hard again on [Santa Anita’s] deep track, and he never was like he was before,” Baffert said.

The races were preps to move him forward, but Baffert said Game Winner “went backwards on me.”

Perhaps it is a testament to his raw ability that Game Winner ran well in the Kentucky Derby. Despite an imperfect spring campaign, a bad start and a wide trip, he missed by only 3 3/4 lengths.

Baffert brought him home to Santa Anita. “We had time to get him back the right way,” Baffert said, and it worked. “He’s happy, his whole mental state has changed.”

In fact, Game Winner has looked super in workouts and gallops. “I think he’s really got it now. He’s figured it out,” Baffert said.

Game Winner has worn blinkers in recent works and wears them Saturday in a race for the first time since his career debut last summer. The intention is to produce more speed.

Baffert, who used the Los Alamitos Derby as a prep race for subsequent 2017 Travers winner West Coast, is supremely confident that Game Winner is better than ever.

“He’s much better. I’m excited to get him back. Mr. West is excited about him,” Baffert said.

He said Game Winner would have returned July 20 in the Grade 1 Haskell at Monmouth Park except West already owns probable Haskell favorite Maximum Security.

They will meet soon enough. Maximum Security is expected to target the Travers, but Baffert said that colt’s status for the Travers “has no influence” on Game Winner.

“If he wants to go there, bring him on,” Baffert said.