Pocono: Baggitt's Blackhawk Zette making noise in Weiss Series

The Bobby Weiss Series at Pocono for sophomore male trotters heads into round three this Monday (April 22), and trainer Robert Baggitt Jr. has a promising son of Cantab Hall looking for his third straight leg victory following a pair of impressive scores. Baggitt has a keen eye for trotters and when he first saw Blackhawk Zette racing at Pocono last fall he took interest.

"I watched him win at Pocono and I liked the way he looked," said Baggitt of the race on October 30 of last year when Blackhawk Zette, driven by Matt Kakaley, was a four length winner in 1:59 over a sloppy surface. "I talked to Matt after the race, and he really liked him too, so after that we started to negotiate and were able to purchase him."

Baggitt had an untested colt at the time of the purchase in November, with just one win in four starts for Blackhawk Zette's breeder and trainer Cozette McAvoy. "We gave him two months off and then started bringing him back," said Baggitt.

On March 13, Blackhawk Zette made his first appearance with Baggitt as the conditioner in a qualifier at Pocono and closed nicely to finish second timed in 1:59 3/5. His sophomore debut would come 12 days later, and the way catch-driver Marcus Miller drove him it appeared to be mostly an educational trip. Yet things changed dramatically in the homestretch of that non-winners of two event. Though shuffled to last on the final turn following a slow early pace, Blackhawk Zette hit another gear in mid-stretch and rallied gamely to win by a nose in a career-best 1:58 3/5 clocking.

"He's just a nice horse to be around," said Baggitt. "After the qualifier he's just been getting better and better with each week. He's got just a natural way of going and is easy to handle."

Kakaley would guide him in the first round of the Weiss Series and be just as patient as Marcus Miller had been in the prior start. Kakaley sat in third off some very soft fractions and then used an explosive burst in the stretch to score by a nose, this time in 1:55 4/5, nearly three seconds faster than his previous personal-best.

This past Monday (April 15) Kakaley again showed no signs of fear that racing Blackhawk Zette from off-the-pace would be an issue and allowed him to race in fourth for much of the mile. Unlike his first two races, though, Kakaley did leave the pylons to follow cover before three-quarters. The difference in this $20,000 Weiss leg was once shifting gears before the homestretch, Blackhawk Zette appeared to relish the opportunity to pass horses and exploded to an effortless 1:54 1/5 mile with a final quarter of 28 1/5. Even more impressive in this victory was there weren't any late-stretch heroics necessary. After a pair of nose decisions, Blackhawk Zette was a decisive winner in the fastest of the four divisions on the Pocono program.

Baggitt has a stable filled with trotters, with just one of the 15 head he trains on the pacing side.

"The way our farm is set up it's ideal for trotters," said Baggitt of his training facility in Bangor, PA. "We've got a straight strip."

Blackhawk Zette looks for a sweep of the preliminary legs on Monday (April 22) with a favorable draw in the first of four $20,000 divisions carded as race three. The J L Sadowsky LLC.-owned colt drew the rail and meets a pair of leg winners in Shermont (post two) and Mighty Deo (post four). Lammtarra, a $500,000 yearling purchase from the first crop of Greenshoe, finished second behind Blackhawk Zette in his sophomore debut and gets another chance at him this week from post five.

Asked if the racing style that Blackhawk Zette has utilized in his first three starts is necessary for his success, Baggitt said, "I'm not sure how he'll be if he gets stung to a quick opening quarter."

With a wealth of training experience, Baggitt recognized the best way to preserve a horse for the long term is not to get him engaged often on the front-end, though versatility is important when the competition gets stiffer. The short field on Monday could give Blackhawk Zette the opportunity to control the pace without too much early work.

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The Weiss is a first step on the stakes road, and Baggitt is hopeful following the series that his colt will meet the demands of Grand Circuit racing.

"He's eligible to the Dexter," said Baggitt, "And the Pennsylvania Sire Stakes, but not the Hambletonian."

The Dexter could pose a conflict for Baggitt and Blackhawk Zette should it require eliminations as the Dexter eliminations would be raced on April 27 at Freehold and the Weiss final is slated two days later on April 29.

Blackhawk Zette has an interesting pedigree, and while Baggitt may have caught the visual while watching the colt as a 2-year-old in a race, he likely had an inkling about the specific bloodlines from the maternal line of this son of Cantab Hall. Most interesting in going back some five generations was the extraordinary number of fillies produced. Blackhawk Zette is just the second foal from the Credit Winner-sired Zette Starlet. The second dam Scottish Starlet (Angus Hall) produced six foals and all were fillies. Her third dam NY Starlet produced five fillies from her first eight foals, with her best credits a pair of male trotters that earned in excess of $235K. My Starlet, her fourth dam, had nine foals with eight of them fillies.

Crown Starlet, a $625K-winning mare, is the fifth dam of Blackhawk Zette and 10 of her first 12 foals happened to be fillies, some of them with extreme talent. Yet what sticks out prominently when looking at Crown Starlet's broodmare career is that her 12th and 13th foals proved to be the most successful. Forever Starlet earned $690K in 2003 as a 2-year-old, the only year she raced. The brilliant filly finished first or second in all 12 of her starts and captured the Breeders Crown. Crown Starlet's next foal was the $705K winner Sir Perseverance, her richest and fastest foal with a 1:52 4/5 record. Both Forever Starlet and Sir Perseverance were the only two sons of Self Possessed.

Fast forward some 20 years and Blackhawk Zette enjoys the same maternal family as Forever Starlet and Sir Perseverance, and is crossed identically to that pair being sired by Cantab Hall, a son of Self Possessed.

Though Baggitt is focused on trotters now, the same was not true back in 2000 when he campaigned the best horse of his career.

"I would say Aces N Sevens was the best one I've ever had," Baggitt said, referring to the son of Cam's Card Shark that pulled off a stunning upset in the $500,000 Hoosier Cup in 2000 when he defeated future Horse of the Year Gallo Blue Chip.