Malibu Smart ($31.40) has no problem with Dowager's distance

The trainer Mike Maker makes hay claiming horses out of middle-distance races and turning them into long-distance turf horses.

The sire English Channel gets long-distance turf horses who often don’t even hit their stride until they’re 5 or 6.

Malibu Smart is a 6-year-old mare by English Channel whom Maker and owners Michael Hui and Phil Forte claimed for $30,000 last December.

Unsurprisingly, given the productive confluence of circumstances, she won the Dowager, a 1 1/2-mile turf stakes, on Sunday at Keeneland.

Actually – it was a surprise. Malibu Smart, despite having captured two in a row, 1 1/2-mile turf allowance races at Saratoga and Kentucky Downs, prevailed at odds of 14-1 in the Grade 3, $350,000 Dowager. She won comfortably, too, coming home 1 3/4 lengths best.

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Fionn, the strong second choice, rallied from well back in the field to nab second, 1 1/4 lengths ahead of third-place Speed Shopper. Massarat, a 26-1 chance, finished fourth, the best placing among three Brendan Walsh-trained entrants. Things did not go so well for weak favorite Pretty Tapit, who got a good trip pressing Modarosa’s slow pace, but was finished not far past the half-mile pole and checked in 10th.

Maker said getting Malibu Smart out to 1 1/2-mile races had proven key to her development, which does seem to be true, but the effect was not immediate. He tried Malibu Smart over 12 furlongs for the first time last winter and she delivered a modest showing racing over Turfway Tapeta. This past spring at Keeneland, making her first start in blinkers, Malibu Smart was fourth, beaten almost 10 lengths, in a first-level grass allowance. Something clicked in late May, however, and other than a start that was rained off turf, Malibu Smart has gone nothing but forward the last several months.

She broke on top from post 2 for Curtis, who watched Moderosa and Pretty Tapit pass him into the first of three turns, producing a perfect pocket trip for Pretty Tapit.

Probably the pace was slow, but who knows, really. Keeneland moved its last two scheduled turf races Friday to dirt, was off turf Saturday, and switched Sunday’s two turf races other than the Dowager to the main track. The course, still holding water despite no rain falling since mid-week, was labeled “good,” Moderosa posting splits of 25.70, 51.54. 1:17.11, and 1:42.38, and 2:08.32 before raising the white flag past the quarter pole. Curtis found a wide gap between Moderosa and a flagging Somethinabouther after turning for home, and Malibu Smart took care of the rest, out-finishing Fionn and galloping out like a wild horse.

“I couldn’t pull her up,” Curtis said.

Malibu Smart was timed in 2:33.27 and paid $31.40. Bred by Shadwell Farm, the mare is out of the Malibu Moon mare Mooghareadh. That’s a hard name to say, but it’s easy to see that her 6-year-old daughter is thriving in long-distance turf races.

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