Gulfstream Park Handicap turning into Pletcher party

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Saturday’s main event at Gulfstream Park, the $500,000 Gulfstream Park Handicap, will not be affected by the quarantine at Payson Park because none of the 19 horses nominated to the race is stabled there. An unidentified horse tested positive for the equine herpesvirus at Payson on Monday, leaving the approximately 480 horses stabled there in quarantine for 21 days.

But two of the more prominent horses eligible for the Grade 2 Gulfstream Park Handicap will not run. The connections of Breeders’ Cup Classic runner-up Effinex and last year’s Florida Derby runner-up, Upstart, have opted to skip the race.

Trainer Jimmy Jerkens said he believes the one-mile Gulfstream Park Handicap would have been a good place to get Effinex started for the year, but he and owner Tri-Bone Stables have elected to send the horse to California for the Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap on March 12.

Trainer Rick Violette said Upstart is still a week or two away from being ready to open his 2016 campaign.

The absence of Effinex and Upstart leaves just six likely starters for the Gulfstream Park Handicap, four of whom – Anchor Down, Blofeld, Stanford, and Itsaknockout – come from the barn of trainer Todd Pletcher. Valid and Grande Shores complete the expected field.

Pletcher said that while he’d prefer not to run all four of his horses against one another, he thinks the Gulfstream Park Handicap is the right race at this time for each one.