Ghost Witha Fire an improving horse entering Los Alamitos Winter Derby
A disrupted campaign at Ruidoso Downs last summer and an abscess in a foot last fall plagued Ghost Witha Fire as a 2-year-old.
This year, Ghost Witha Fire has had a better start to the season, and will be favored to win his stakes debut in Saturday’s $183,350 Los Alamitos Winter Derby at 400 yards.
Ghost Witha Fire set the fastest qualifying time for the Winter Derby by winning the first of three trials on Jan. 28 by 1 1/2 lengths in 19.58 seconds.
Trained by Monty Arrossa for Matt and Bendi Dunn, Ghost Witha Fire will start from post 2 in a field of 10 on Saturday. His main rival is stablemate Take a Swig of This, a trial race winner in 19.73 seconds who was second in the $1.11 million Heritage Place Futurity at Remington Park last May.
Ghost Witha Fire won for the second time in his sixth start in the Winter Derby trials. He was winless in three starts at Remington Park and Ruidoso Downs last spring and summer. A Texas-bred, Ghost Witha Fire was vanned off after finishing third in a division of the Rainbow Futurity trials at Ruidoso Downs in July.
Ghost Witha Fire won a division of the Golden State Million Futurity trials at Los Alamitos in October, but was sidelined with a foot injury. The gelding made his comeback in the Winter Derby trials.
Arrossa told Los Alamitos publicity last month that he was encouraged when Ghost Witha Fire worked 220 yards in 12 seconds from the gate on Jan. 12 in advance of his 3-year-old debut.
“We were hoping he would come back and run to that form,” Arrossa said.
Take a Swig of This was sidelined after the Heritage Place Futurity and did not race again until he finished a troubled fifth in an allowance race on a wet-fast track at Los Alamitos on Dec. 31. Take a Swig of This slipped and nearly fell under jockey Armando Cervantes at the start of that race.
“Armando did a good job of picking him up and just saving him and getting him down through there,” Arrossa said.
In the Winter Derby, Take a Swig of This breaks from post 6 and will be ridden by Eduardo Nicasio. Cervantes will ride Ghost Witha Fire.
Arrossa trains three of the finalists including Chicks First Flash, who won the $315,000 Pacific Coast Quarter Horse Racing Association Breeders’ Futurity at 350 yards in October. Chicks First Flash was second to Interesting Eagle in the Winter Derby trials, sneaking into the final with the 10th and last qualifying time of 20.06 seconds.
:: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.