G.G. Ryder foils barnmate Summer Hit in San Francisco Mile

G.G. Ryder got a perfect trip and recorded his first graded stakes victory in Saturday’s Grade 3, $100,315 San Francisco Mile at Golden Gate Fields in Albany, Calif.

G.G. Ryder ($6.20) sat behind stablemate Summer Hit as that one set the pace with Tiz Dynamic sitting just off him. G.G. Ryder, saving ground as he and Are You Kidding Me alternated for third, 3 1/2 lengths behind the cruising leader.

Ricardo Gonzalez, who enjoyed a ground-saving trip aboard G.G. Ryder, moved the 4-year-old Chhaya Dance colt to the outside of Summer Hit and clearly had him measured at the eighth pole despite being 1 1/2 lengths back.

G.G. Ryder quickly pulled even and began to inch clear, but Summer Hit continued gamely to the wire, losing by only one-half length while suffering what track announcer Michael Wrona described as another “exasperating loss” in the race.

“He relaxed really good for me,” said Gonzalez, who now has four wins and two seconds aboard G.G. Ryder. “I thought they’d go a little faster. He’s a nice horse. All you have to do is get him in the right spot and he’ll come through for you. If a horse gets next to him, he’ll just pin his ears back and fight.”

Summer Hit has run second in three straight runnings of the San Francisco Mile, losing by a neck to Tigah in 2013, three-quarters of a length to Pepper Crown, who ran fourth Saturday, in 2014, before Saturday’s defeat.

Summer Hit’s rider, Russell Baze, had no excuses.

“He was going very comfortable,” said Baze. “When we turned for home and I asked him, he gave me that push, and I thought they are never going to catch him. Then down around the eighth pole it was like, ‘I’m trying boss, I’m trying,’ but there wasn’t much left in the tank. He ran hard. It was a lot to ask off one short prep, and on a soft turf course, which is not his best going.”

Are You Kidding Me was third, beaten 1 1/4lengths. The winning time was 1:37.87.

G.G. Ryder is owned by the partnership of trainer Jerry Hollendorfer and Hollendorfer’s long-time client George Todaro. He has not won 9 of 18 starts. He earned $60,000 to increase his career earnings to $315,114.

He won the Alcatraz on the turf here last year and later ran second to Pepper Crown in the Grade 3 Berkeley on the main track.