By My Standards runs away from rivals in New Orleans Classic
RACE REPLAY IS NOT AVAILABLE
The trainer Bret Calhoun had two live rounds for the Grade 2, $400,000 New Orleans Classic. Silver Dust was a dud but By My Standards fired, blasting past his stablemate at the three-sixteenths pole and going on to a three-length victory in the 1 1/8-mile race for older horses.
Captivating Moon raced near the back of the field and rallied solidly into a surprisingly slow pace to finish a clear second over Chess Chief. Chess Chief was disqualified from third to sixth for coming in sharply inside the final furlong causing a chain reaction that compromised several horses, including sixth-place finisher Fearless. Fearless was strangely favored at odds of 9-5 despite having only two races behind him, and he was unable to come close to duplicating his front-running first-level allowance victory at Gulfstream, the race that motivated all Saturday’s betting action.
:: To stay up to date, follow us on: Facebook | Instagram | Twitter
Fearless broke decently but it was By My Standards who quickly angled over from post 8 to take the early lead, giving way into the first turn to Silver Dust, who went clear and doled out slow splits. Silver Dust’s old, bad gate habits returned in the New Orleans Classic, where he was antsy before the start and leaped into the air when the latch sprang.
Still, Silver Dust wound up cruising along through a half-mile in a tepid 50.09 seconds, but even there it was By My Standards, rating along in second, who looked like he was going better. Jockey Gabe Saez let By My Standards cruise up to Silver Dust at the quarter pole, the head of the long Fair Grounds homestretch, and Silver Dust, winner of two stakes races already this meet, offered little resistance. By My Standards powered to the front and never looked back. He ran 1 1/8 miles over a fast track in 1:50.07 and paid $6.60 as the second choice.
By My Standards won the second stakes race of his career in his second start as a 4-year-old on Saturday, the first having come one year ago when he went from a maiden win to victory in the $1 million Louisiana Derby. By My Standards was battling a hoof problem and had a difficult trip finishing 12th in the Kentucky Derby and, his connections giving the hoof time to grow and heal, the colt didn’t start again as a 3-year-old. He returned to action with a ridiculously easy second-level allowance victory last month at Fair Grounds, trained with aplomb, according to Calhoun, in the weeks before Saturday’s start, and took a solid step forward in the New Orleans Classic.
Owned by Chester Thomas’s Allied Racing Stable, By My Standards is by Goldencents out of A Jealous Woman, by Muqtarib. His future in the older-horse dirt-route handicap division would look bright had the COVID-19 pandemic not clouded the spring and summer stakes schedule.