Hersh: How I'd play Saratoga on Monday, July 21
There’s one 9-5 favorite (Grace Hall, race 8) and a couple 2-1's, but the rest of the morning-line favorites on this card are 5-2 or higher, and it is most definitely that kind of day. Five turf races, three of them sprints, and three of them, to my mind, ridiculously tough.
Race 1 has a septet of horses that are virtually inseparable, and it’s a good spot to keep an eye on fractions and race shape on a main track that at times flirted with an inside speed bias during opening weekend.
KEY HORSE – EARLY PICK FOUR
There aren’t a lot of single entities that appeal to me on the card, and the later races are so tough, contentious, and fraught, that the early pick four seemed the most manageable sequence without stabbing all over the place and depleting the bankroll sans strong opinions.
CONSOLE, No. 3 in race 5, is my key to the early pick four. He basically lost all chance at the start while facing much stronger foes on Polytrack when last seen in May at Arlington. He’s since been freshened and clearly pointed to this race by a high-percentage outfit, and his recent works at Churchill Downs Training Center are very quick by that surface’s standards. Perhaps the best race of his career came in a Saratoga turf sprint last summer. And while it’s obvious that previous connections found something amiss to lose him for $25,000, the Mike Maker barn excels with such reclamation projects, and he is not entered to be claimed here.
I though the Chad Brown-trained firster PARTISAN POLITICS (2) in race 2, the pick four’s first leg, looked relatively solid, but I’ll back up with DELAWARE BAY (7) and RAINHA DA BATERIA (8).
In race 3, I don’t trust mildly favored ANNIE WALKER (1) at all, her merits in this spot based mainly on a soft-pace, front-end romp at a longer distance last out at Belmont. The pace scenario here is muddy at best, and since the field is short, I’ll spread to the greatest extent possible.
Race 4, a $20K maiden claimer, also has a huge number of plausibilities if you don’t trust favored long-layoff comebacker ARTEMUS PAPERBOY (6), another Maker horse. And I don/t.
FOUR HORSE STAKES
Toasting and Angel’s Glory are out of the restricted Shine Again, leaving a field of four. It’s not a simple proposition. GRACE HALL is a route horse in a sprint race with a year-plus layoff still hanging over her form. MY MISS AURELIA, a champion, was training for a comeback start a full year ago and just now makes it back to the races. No idea what to expect. And BETTER LUCKY is a complete unknown on dirt. It’s entirely possible that BRIDGEHAMPTON, the least-known of the quartet, scampers clear early and proves formidable.
PRICE SHOTS
In race 6, 15-1 shot UNDER SCRUTINY (2) and 6-1 chance DIXIE GEM (4) both caught my eye as potential under-the-radar improvers. I wouldn’t want to lean on either one in a pick-whatever, but would consider playing horizontally in some combination.
The same goes for 12-1 BIG ISLAND BOY (6) and 8-1 HANDSOME DENNIS (9) in race 9. Given their decent N1X allowance performances, pedigree, and connections, the two favorites, BELLY OF THE WHALE and HONOR THE KITTEN, really should have come back in another allowance race rather than a $40K N2L claimer. It’s at least a minor red flag.