Graded Stakes Analysis: Chicago Handicap

On paper I liked DISCO BARBIE to win the Chicago Handicap. Then I watched her two races at Presque Isle Downs – and I loved her.

Disco Barbie was brave holding her position when just off the flank of the early leader in the first of those races on May 13, and she proceeded to open up and crush N2X allowance horses that day. But her second PID race was even better. Trapped behind a wall of horses turning for home, she made her way to the outside, inhaled the lead pack, and drew off through the stretch with her jockey a statue.

Disco Barbie has kind of a funky stride, especially in her hind end, and it makes perfect sense that a surface switch – from dirt to synthetic, in this case – might suit her. She’s got an ideal outside draw Saturday, should love the seven furlongs, has reported shipped well, and is a likely winner if she handles the AP Polytrack like she did the PID Tapeta, though I doubt the odds will be as high as 4/1.

MY OPTION is capable of a far better race than she delivered from too close to the pace last out at Woodbine. Her trainer Chris Block said the filly was brought back to the races this year more slowly than the year before, when she won her comeback race, and her defeat against Illinois-breds at Hawthorne to start her 2014 campaign should be seen in that light. She’s an overlay today with a nice chance to move forward.

I expected a good synthetic spring and summer from COZZE UP LADY (who won this race last year) after her wild deep-stretch rally to win the off-turf Mardi Gras at Fair Grounds, but instead, she delivered a one-paced clunker in the Madison, a race that should really have suited her. It’s hard to know what to expect now, but anticipate Cozze Up Lady being ridden to make one big move this time.

APROPOS didn’t have the best trip when third in the Madison, but though she’s run decently in both her Polytrack tries, I’d have liked to have seen a little more push-buttony pick up from the mare.

EDEN PRAIRIE got a farm freshening after her late fade in the Madison. She and My Option always have been close in ability, and if she breaks and leads or presses through slow splits, she, too, could be there at the end.