Keeneland opens with typically loaded card
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LEXINGTON, Ky. – Could it get any better? The Friday opener of the Keeneland spring meet is racing at its finest, with three stakes anchoring a 10-race card rounded out by four allowances and three maiden-specials.
Six-figure purses, including sizable bonuses for Kentucky-breds, are the rule, with an $80,000 maiden race for 2-year-olds being the lone exception. The feature is the Grade 1, $600,000 Ashland Stakes, a key Kentucky Oaks prep headed by Wonder Wheel, the reigning champion among the current crop of 3-year-old fillies.
A multitude of the biggest names in North American racing will be here, from jockeys Irad Ortiz Jr. and Flavien Prat to trainers Todd Pletcher and Chad Brown at a 15-day meet that runs through April 28.
“It’s going to be an awesome meet,” said Gatewood Bell, Keeneland vice president of racing.
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Indeed it is. Eight stakes worth more than a combined $4 million will be run on the first two cards alone – Sunday is dark because of the Easter holiday – capped by the Grade 1, $1 million Blue Grass Stakes, which anchors the biggest day of the meet Saturday.
First post daily is 1 p.m. Eastern. Ontrack ticketing is available online only, with Keeneland purposely limiting attendance to somewhere around 25,000. All three Saturdays already are sold out.
The Ashland, with a field of seven, goes as the ninth race (5:16), directly preceded by a pair of $400,000 stakes for 3-year-old males, those being the Lafayette (race 7, 4:12) and Grade 3 Transylvania (race 8, 4:44). The Transylvania represents what much of the racing will look like this month, with a full gate of 12 being extremely well matched.
The Ashland marks the final pre-Oaks start for Wonder Wheel, who will be seeking a third Grade 1 win at Keeneland. The daughter of uber-sire Into Mischief won the Grade 1 Alcibiades and Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies last fall on her way to being named an Eclipse Award champion. Her only start as a 3-year-old resulted in a narrow defeat in what was an overall solid comeback in the Feb. 11 Suncoast Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs.
“Is she going to be at her absolute, very best?” Casse asked. “Close to it.”
The legendary Wise Dan, a 2020 Racing Hall of Fame inductee, is the only horse with as many as four Grade 1 wins here, spread out over three racing seasons, from 2012-14.
Besides the Blue Grass, an 11-race Saturday card will include four other graded stakes – the Grade 1 Madison, Grade 2 Appalachian, Grade 3 Shakertown, and Grade 3 Commonwealth. The Blue Grass is expected to get about 10 Kentucky Derby hopefuls, led by the Pletcher-trained Tapit Trice.
Clouds (but no rain) and high temperatures around 60 are in the weekend forecast.
Ward loaded for bear
Wesley Ward has yet to make the Hall of Fame ballot, but that just might be a matter of time. The 55-year-old native of Washington State, who was the 1984 Eclipse winner as top apprentice rider, not only has won six Breeders’ Cup races as a trainer and ignited a trend of American horses competing each June at Royal Ascot, but he also is renowned for his prowess with 2-year-olds, particularly at the Keeneland spring meet.
More often than not, the Ward babies draw huge tote action in the 4 1/2-furlong dashes out of the Headley chute alongside U.S. 60. That surely will be the case again this spring, starting with the very first race of the meet. Ward has a gelding named Bledsoe as the likely favorite, along with Alexandra’s Song, the lone filly in an oversubscribed lineup, first up on the also-eligibles list.
Bledsoe is named for Ward’s fellow Washingtonian and friend, Drew Bledsoe, the former football star. “He’s from Walla Walla and now owns a winery that makes some really good wine,” said Ward.
Bledsoe, a Ward homebred, “is one of those horses that you get excited about when he works,” said Ward. “Every time he’s worked, he’s been an eye-opener.”
Eight 2-year-old races are in the condition book for the meet – four are open and four are restricted to fillies. Ward said he expects to be represented in most, if not all.
◗ Modern Games, winner of the Breeders’ Cup Mile here last fall for Godolphin and Charlie Appleby, will make his 4-year-old debut next Friday as a heavy favorite in the Grade 1 Maker’s Mark Mile. Godolphin and Appleby also will run their standout filly With The Moonlight in the Grade 1 Jenny Wiley next Saturday.
◗ Derby hopefuls continue to make their way through the stable gates at Churchill Downs in Louisville. Angel of Empire and Derma Sotogake were among six arrivals scheduled by the end of this week.
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