New Orleans Classic may be a Bret Calhoun exacta

Maybe the only horse that can stop the streaking Bret Calhoun-trained Silver Dust is the Calhoun-trained By My Standards.

Silver Dust has crossed the wire first or second in his last five starts and has emerged as the solid leader of the local older-horse dirt-route division, his performances Jan. 18 in the Louisiana Stakes and Feb. 15 in the Mineshaft Stakes among the best in his career. He’s the 2-1 morning-line favorite in the Grade 2, $400,000 New Orleans Classic, where he must catch the Todd Pletcher-trained Fearless and hold off By My Standards if he’s to win the biggest race of his career.

Nine are entered in the New Orleans Classic, the 1 1/8-mile dirt race that was called the New Orleans Handicap until Fair Grounds ended handicap racing this season. Captivating Moon is cross-entered in the Muniz Memorial but runs there only with a switch to dirt. He, Lone Sailor, Sonneteer, Chess Chief, and Tenfold could struggle as off-the-pace runners in a race that might unfold at a moderate tempo.

Since finishing second in 2019 New Orleans Handicap, Silver Dust has followed a steady arc of improvement. Gelding and assiduous repetition finally tamped down the bad habits that, during his early career, suppressed his native talent. Silver Dust once was barely manageable, but his pre-race behavior, from paddock to starting gate, has grown smoother and more reliable. He’s grown on the track, too, showing more gears than grind in recent starts, and he won the Mineshaft last month despite having to be checked in traffic before the first turn.

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Though Calhoun speaks glowingly of Silver Dust’s post-Mineshaft training, By My Standards has been going at least as well. By My Standards went back-to-back in a maiden race and the Louisiana Derby a year ago and worked up to the Kentucky Derby like he might make an impact, but a troubled trip and lingering foot trouble undid him at Churchill Downs, and By My Standards spent the rest of 2019 away from the races giving his bothersome hoof a chance to fully heal. He returned Feb. 9 in a second-level Fair Grounds allowance race and won by six lengths, jockey Gabe Saez barely moving a muscle through the homestretch in what looked like an ideal comeback race, one that required more effort than a morning work but not excessive exertion.

“I’d prefer not to run them against each other, but both owners and horses deserve to run in that spot,” Calhoun said.

In the eight-year span between 2007 and 2014, Pletcher won the New Orleans Handicap an amazing six times. He hasn’t won it since but thinks enough of Fearless to bump him from a first-level allowance victory to this Grade 2 in just his third start. Four-year-old Fearless debuted with a maiden sprint win before crushing allowance rivals in a Feb. 1 Gulfstream Park route, where he was ridden hard between the five-sixteenths and three-sixteenths poles before being eased across the finish. His 99 Beyer Speed Figure from that race tops this field, and jockey Irad Ortiz Jr. figures to try for the lead Saturday.

Gun It turned in a career-best performance finishing second by three-quarters of a length to Silver Dust in the Mineshaft, that despite racing greenly through the final 1 1/2 furlongs while, as always, failing to change leads.