Inside post forces Palm Cottage's hand in Thoroughbred Club of America

Palm Cottage showed flashes of ability during a six-start 2021 campaign. Her talent has shined bright in two races this year.

In July, Palm Cottage nearly set a six-furlong track record at Ellis Park while winning a first-level allowance under wraps, her first start for trainer Paulo Lobo, and came right back to capture a second-level Saratoga allowance despite breaking through the gate before the start and idling in deep stretch.

There will be no time to idle Saturday at Keeneland, where Palm Cottage makes her stakes debut in a competitive renewal of the Grade 3, $350,000 Thoroughbred Club of America, a Win and You’re In for the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint. Palm Cottage has a challenging inside draw in post 2 while facing eight foes, including several other pace players outside her.

Among those is Slammed, the 3-1 morning-line favorite in a six-furlong dirt race where, on paper, no one is going to be bet much lower than that.

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“I thought she’d be more in the 4-1 to 6-1 range,” said Slammed’s trainer, Todd Fincher, who won the Ack Ack at Churchill last weekend with Senor Buscador.

Senor Buscador is aimed at the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, and Slammed will wind up in the BC Filly and Mare Sprint with a good showing Saturday. Bred in New Mexico, Slammed made her first nine starts at New Mexican tracks before Fincher brought her to Del Mar this summer. Slammed hit 98, a career best, on the Beyer Speed Figure scale setting a strong pace and easily winning an allowance race there before a poor start and a demanding trip produced a close second behind Edgeway in the Aug. 28 Rancho Bernardo.

“Her hindquarters slipped at the start – her ass end went down, her head came up. Those are fast fillies, and she was trying to recover from that,” Fincher said. “If she breaks on her feet, I think we’ll be in front. If not, she can make one run.”

Two more fast fillies, Joyful Cadence and Happy Soul, are drawn outside Slammed. Club Car, a Keeneland lover who was beaten a neck in the 2021 TCA, could benefit from a duel, as could Sconsin, Carribean Caper, and Li’l Tootsie. Sconsin historically has run her best races at Churchill and has not been at her peak in recent outings, while Carribean Caper lost for the first time in six career starts making a belated 2022 debut seven weeks ago in Virginia. Li’l Tootsie will enjoy cutting back from 1 1/16 miles, but trainer Tom Amoss is not pleased with the filly’s rail draw.

“Really disappointed. Her game is to come around,” Amoss said. “She did get really good this summer. She cannot get 1 1/16 miles around two turns.”

Palm Cottage’s tactics from post 2? Lobo leaves that to new jockey Flavien Prat.

“She has the speed, but Prat has a way of putting the horse in the right spot,” Lobo said.

Palm Cottage has dazzled publicly in her two races this year; watching her every morning has produced a similar impression.

“She trains like a monster,” Lobo said. “Man, she is doing so well right now.”

Let Prat figure out the trip. Palm Cottage is good enough to win.

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