Inda relies on his one and only
ARCADIA, Calif. - Pericia Fina, a 5-year-old mare who starts in the seventh race at Santa Anita's Oak Tree meeting on Friday, is the only active horse in trainer Eduardo Inda's four-horse stable. The other three, he says, are 2-year-olds, far from reaching the races.
"She's the only horse I've got that's running," he said. "It's tough right now."
Best known as the trainer of the multiple stakes winner Riboletta in 2000, Inda, 66, has started two horses this year - Pericia Fina and Gifted Gina, a maiden claimer who was claimed from him in January.
Pericia Fina was a stakes winner in Chile in 2008, and has one victory in nine starts this year, an 11-1 upset in an allowance race at Del Mar on Aug. 9. Friday, she will start over 1 1/4 miles on turf for the first time in her U.S. career in an optional claimer for fillies and mares.
Inda is hoping that the added distance, and hopefully a pace to follow, will help Pericia Fina and give the trainer his second win of the year.
"I think a mile and a quarter will help," he said. "I need two or three good speed horses."
Owned by a partnership, Pericia Fina's Del Mar win was over 1 1/16 miles on turf. In two subsequent starts, she has finished sixth in optional claimers over a mile and 1 1/16 miles. In the latter race, she was along the rail and made up five lengths in the final quarter-mile.
"As soon as she passed the wire, she was flying," Inda said. "I don't think she wants to be on the rail."
Richard Migliore has the ride on Pericia Fina on Friday, and the field of eight fillies and mares may not have the speed that Inda wants. There are no confirmed front-runners, although Alpine Yodel has set the pace in the past.
The field includes Bel Air Sizzle, who won the Valentine Dancer Handicap in February and is making her 13th start of the year; Dreamalong, who was fifth in the Grade 1 Del Mar Oaks in August; and Spring Style, who is trying 1 1/4 miles for the first time after running well over 1 1/8 miles on turf last winter.
Don't Forget Faith will have no trouble with the distance. She won an optional claimer over 1 3/8 miles on turf at Del Mar on July 29.