King: Kentucky Downs pick three play for Saturday, Sept. 6

Kentucky Downs opens Saturday with three stakes offering a total of $650,000 in purses for Kentucky-breds, and something horseplayers will appreciate – a 50-cent pick three linking the three stakes together. Here’s my strategy for playing the modest wager, beginning with the first leg, The Kentucky Downs Juvenile.

RACE 7

Luck of the Kitten (#2), who graduated from the maiden races on Million Day at Arlington after a runner-up finish at Saratoga in his debut, looks like the best horse in the race. And though cutting back in distance, he has enough natural speed to be well suited by the move from a mile to seven furlongs on a course that played well to speed last year.

He is an ‘A’ play in Ticketmaker, but this handicapper can’t feel confident singling him. So, two ‘Bs’ get used as secondary plays, in order of preference: Reality (#4), and Czar (#9).

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RACE 8

As in the previous race, trainer Wesley Ward has the most likely winner: To Be Determined (#1), an ‘A’ play. She ran well to just miss in a maiden race at Saratoga last month, earning the race’s top Beyer Speed Figure, a 74.

Late Spring (#2), who finished well to break her maiden at first asking at Ellis Park, and Saratoga maiden winner So Cal (#8) are lesser ‘B’ runners in the Kentucky Downs Juvenile Fillies.

RACE 9

The wager closes out with the Dueling Grounds Derby for 3-year-olds after the preceding stakes races for 2-year-olds.

Medal Count (#8), shifting from dirt to turf, is the class and is likely to move forward with the surface switch after showing talent but being inconsistent on the main track this spring and summer. He won on grass in January at Gulfstream.

If by chance he does not fire, which happened when he went through the motions in finishing ninth in the Haskell last time out, Can’thelpbelieving (#2) and Proud Azteca (#1) are the ones most likely to capitalize. They are secondary ‘B’ plays, with Medal Count rated as an ‘A.’

THE TICKETMAKER TICKET

With Kentucky Downs offering the wager in 50-cent increments, using the horses above in a pick three is inexpensive. Plugging the horses outlined above into Ticketmaker with a minimum wager of 50 cents and a budget of $13.50 results in the following combinations and tickets: