One Fine Dream fits well in Iowa Stallion Stakes
Handicapping alone is work enough for a horseplayer, but just trying to understand the actual race conditions for the Iowa Stallion Stakes at Prairie Meadows is a whole project unto itself. The fillies division of the race is Friday night, and the $60,000 open division, contested over a mile and 70 yards, drew nine entrants for Saturday’s race.
These races are sponsored by the Iowa Thoroughbred Breeders and Owners Association, and eligibility is a convoluted affair, to say the least. Every December, the ITBOA holds a stallion “auction.” The lots are stallions “donated” by the farm at which they stand, or their owner. When a stallion is “sold” at the auction, all of his progeny born two years later, regardless of the state in which they are foaled, are eligible for the Iowa Stallion Stakes so long as their owners pay a first nomination fee the December before the race and a second one in March. The confusion comes because the Iowa Stallion Stakes has only a tangential relationship to stallions that actually stand in Iowa.
And so Saturday’s race has been a long time in the making. The stallion auction that produced the eligible list of sires took place in 2011. The stallions then covered mares early in 2012. The foals were born in 2013, and now are 3-year-olds – nine of whom are racing Saturday night at Prairie Meadows.
The race’s most likely winner, after all that, just might be an Iowa-bred. One Fine Dream has gone 4 for 4 in Iowa-bred competition and 0 for 4 in races not statebred-restricted, but his form is good enough to win this race.
Drawn on the rail for jockey Shane Laviolette and trainer Kelly Von Hemel, One Fine Dream showed in winning the Cyclones Stakes last out that he can race as effectively around two turns as one. His lone previous route start had come last fall at Keeneland, and it was no wonder he proved no match for the likes of Gun Runner that day, but in the Cyclones he made an early move into decent pace and held well to win by neck. There’s speed drawn to this outside and One Fine Dream probably would be well served tucking in behind the early leaders if he is willing to take kickback.
Oklahoma-bred Royal Lion surely will be shorter-priced than his 10-1 morning-line odds. He was a close third to Triple Crown participant Suddenbreakingnews in the Trevor Clever last fall at Remington before easily winning an Oklahoma-bred route stakes there in the slop. His lone start this year, in the Paul Bunyan Stakes at speed-favoring Canterbury Park, came at a six-furlong distance short of his best, and he should improve significantly Saturday on his distant fifth-place finish there.
Seismic Force got loose on the lead and won a two-turn maiden race by more than 11 lengths on June 23 at Prairie Meadows, but such a cozy trip looks unlikely this time. Count N Gold has sprinted in this three starts, twice catching sloppy tracks, and his running lines and pedigree combine to suggest improvement is possible in his two-turn debut.