Parx: Primal Love finds best form for Monday allowance

Despite a quarantine that prevents horses from two barns on the backstretch from even going onto the track to train and restricts entries to healthy animals already on the grounds, horsemen at Parx Racing filled the entry box for Monday’s nine-race card, the first that was drawn following a positive test for equine herpesvirus.

Sal Sinatra, the director of racing, was able to put together a program with 88 horses, including a full field of 12 $10,000 maiden claimers in the finale and a pair of 11-horse fields. The $36,000 feature, a first-level allowance sprint for Pennsylvania-breds, attracted an evenly matched group of nine.

The six-furlong eighth race includes Primal Love, who dramatically reversed his form to defeat maiden claimers by nearly 13 lengths; Golden Punch, who has recorded four consecutive bullet half-mile works since his last race on Sept. 29; and Domissme, whose last start following a freshening produced a blowout victory over open-company maiden special weight company.

The 4-year-old Primal Love was a well-beaten sixth in his last two starts during the summer. Given a seven-week break and with five-pound apprentice Hector Caballero aboard for the first time, Primal Love got an uncontested lead and cruised to a 12 3/4-length victory on Oct. 14. From a small sampling, trainer Pat Farro is 2 for 4 with a $3.45 return on investment with last-out maiden winners making the second start of their form cycle in a dirt sprint.

Golden Punch, beaten three times at this same level at odds of 7-2 or lower, may be ready to finally break through while getting a positive rider switch to leading jockey Kendrick Carmouche. Carmouche was aboard when the Lupe Preciado-trained Golden Punch won his maiden against open company in May.

The lightly raced Domissme was eighth when he tried this condition for the first time in late September, but moves into the barn of Cathal Lynch, whose record with new acquisitions in dirt sprints following a break of 31 to 60 days is 6 for 22 (27 percent).

Desire to Acquire got burned out in a pace duel making his first start off the claim for trainer Scott Lake earlier this month. He may be fitter for his second start for Lake and second start off the layoff, an angle that Lake shows 5-for-16 success (31 percent) with the past two years.