King Kreesa comes off eight-month layoff to win West Point
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – King Kreesa was last year's New York-bred champion older male and champion turf horse, and he showed why by returning from a more than eight-month layoff Sunday to win the $150,000 West Point Stakes at Saratoga.
King Kreesa made his debut for trainer David Donk in the West Point. King Kreesa, who was trained by Jeremiah Engelhart during his championship run, came to Donk in April but developed a quarter crack in his right front foot that delayed his season debut. Donk did an expert job of getting King Kreesa ready and ran him in a bar shoe in the West Point.
"He's not as ready as I wanted maybe," Donk said. "I would have liked to put one more long work into him."
As it turned out, Donk had King Kreesa plenty fit for the West Point, a 1 1/16-mile turf race. King Kreesa was eager leaving the gate, but jockey Irad Ortiz got him to relax and rated him on the lead through leisurely fractions of 24.93 seconds, 49.71, and 1:13.38 while being tracked by the 7-5 favorite Lubash.
Lubash moved up to challenge King Kreesa for the lead from the outside in the upper stretch but could not get by as King Kreesa held on to win by a head. It was a length back from Lubash to the 5-2 third choice Notacatbutallama in third.
King Kreesa, the 17-10 second choice, paid $5.40 to win. He is owned by Gerald and Susan Kresa. The final time of the West point was 1:42.07.
Donk said it will be some time before King Kreesa's foot is back to normal.
"The foot still needs a lot of growing out," Donk said. "It won't really be 100 percent until next year. I was afraid to take the bar shoe off. He was training so well with it."
When asked how long the bar shoe would remain on, Donk said, "I don't know. I've never run a horse with a bar shoe before. I'm 1 for 1 with a bar shoe."
The next race for the New York-bred turf division is the $125,000 Ashley T. Cole on Sept. 14 at Belmont Park. That race is followed on the schedule by the $200,000 Mohawk on Oct. 18.