Mubtaahij tops small field for Lone Star Park Handicap

GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas – Hall of Fame rider Mike Smith will make a short detour through Texas on Sunday en route to next month’s Belmont Stakes.

Smith, who will shoot for the Triple Crown aboard Justify, first has business at Lone Star Park, where he will ride Mubtaahij in the Grade 3, $200,000 Lone Star Park Handicap. Smith has the mount for Justify’s trainer, Bob Baffert, and the men will be looking for their second straight win in the Lone Star after Danzing Candy in 2017.

“I love Lone Star,” Smith said Friday. “I’ve got a lot of friends that live in the area. It’s nice to get back and ride a good horse at a fun place.”

The Lone Star Handicap, at 1 1/16 miles, is the co-richest race of the meet. It will go with a field of four following the scratch of Full of Luck. Others set to start are Fear the Cowboy, a multiple Grade 3 winner who flew in Friday from Ocala, Fla.; Shotgun Kowboy, third in last year’s Lone Star; and South Beach, who adds blinkers for red-hot trainer Steve Asmussen.

Lone Star will have a $100,000 minimum guaranteed pool for the late pick four, which runs on races 7-10.

Lone Star Park Handicap

KEY CONTENDERS

Mubtaahij, by Dubawi
Last 3 Beyers: 102-103-94

◗ Smith is reuniting with Mubtaahij, whom he guided to a runner-up finish in the Santa Anita Handicap on March 10. Mubtaahij has made one start since, finishing third in the Dubai World Cup on March 31 at Meydan.

“I’ve raced against him for several years, ridden him once,” Smith said. “He’s a really nice horse … tries hard every time. He’s coming off a very good third place in the Dubai World Cup and he looks good training in the mornings. If he fires his ‘A’ race, he’ll be very tough.”

◗ Mubtaahij won last year’s Grade 1 Awesome Again at Santa Anita in his first start following the 2017 Dubai World Cup, in which he ran fourth to Arrogate – and Smith.

◗ Mubtaahij will break from the rail Sunday and is the 124-pound highweight as an earner of $5.7 million. He races for Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid al Maktoum.

Fear the Cowboy, by Cowboy Cal
Last 3 Beyers: 98-93-100

◗ He faced Mubtaahij two starts ago, when third in the Santa Anita Handicap. The track was labeled wet-fast, and trainer Efren Loza Jr. said he would prefer a dry track for Fear the Cowboy on Sunday.

◗ Fear the Cowboy last raced April 21, finishing third by 1 1/4 lengths in the Grade 2 Charles Town Classic.

“That was the first time he went three turns,” Loza said. “We’d run before on a bullring and decided to send him there because there was good money and the horse handled the bullring well before. He ran a good race. The last three-eighths he lost a little bit of his momentum.”

◗ The Charles Town Classic produced a Lone Star winner back in 2010, when Redding Colliery parlayed a third-place finish in the 1 1/8-mile fixture into a 6 3/4-length score in Texas.

◗ Luis Negron has the mount from post 4.