Jungle Juice first Meah-trained local starter since spring

Trainer Anna Meah relocated from California to Kentucky last March, and her central location allowed her to win nine races at seven venues in the final nine months of the year.

Meah, 28, has sent two horses to Santa Anita this winter and will have her first starter at the track since March on Sunday when Jungle Juice starts in an allowance race for fillies and mares at six furlongs.

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Jungle Juice won consecutive starter-allowance races on dirt at Keeneland and Churchill Downs in October and November, but was a troubled sixth of 10 in an allowance race on the synthetic track Dec. 18 at Turfway Park.

“She loves the dirt,” Meah said Thursday. “We might as well see what we’ve got.”

Meah does not have plans to return to California, but did send Jungle Juice and the California-bred maiden Sabuda to Santa Anita to take advantage of allowance race conditions and the statebred program. Both are eligible for bonuses in their initial starts at Santa Anita as out-of-state horses racing in California for the first time.

Jungle Juice is part of a solid field of five that includes Hotitude, who was second in an allowance race Dec. 11 at Los Alamitos, and Gidgetta, fourth in an allowance race Nov. 29 at Del Mar in her first start since March.