Prat looks for another big opening day at Santa Anita

Jockey Flavien Prat has had some memorable afternoons on opening day of the Santa Anita winter-spring meeting. Prat, 28, won two graded stakes on opening day in 2016, was winless in 2017, won two graded stakes in 2018, and missed the big day last year because of illness.

Prat won the Mathis Brothers Mile in 2016 on Conquest Enforcer and again in 2018 with River Boyne. On Saturday’s opening day at Santa Anita, Prat is booked to ride Scarto in the $200,000 Mathis Brothers Mile and is scheduled to have mounts in the other five stakes.

As of Sunday, Prat’s other confirmed mounts were Collusion Illusion in the Grade 1 Malibu Stakes for 3-year-olds at seven furlongs, Sharp Samurai in the Grade 2 San Antonio Stakes at 1 1/16 miles for older horses, and Beguiled in the $75,000 Lady of Shamrock Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at a mile on turf, according to his agent, Derek Lawson.

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Lawson said Prat will have a mount for trainer Chad Brown in the Grade 1 American Oaks for 3-year-old fillies at 1 1/4 miles on turf and trainer Bob Baffert in the Grade 1 La Brea Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at seven furlongs. Those mounts will be finalized when entries for the 11-race program are taken on Monday.

Prat has been the leading rider at the last two Santa Anita winter-spring meetings, when statistics were kept from opening day through the final day in mid-June. Prat led the standings for the entirety of the 2016-17 and 2017-18 Santa Anita meetings when statistics were kept in two segments in those years - from opening day to early April and from mid-April to closing day in late June or early July.

Through Saturday, Prat led all riders in Southern California at all meetings with 184 wins. Abel Cedillo was second with 137 wins, slightly in front of Umberto Rispoli in third with 124 wins.

Prat will ride Scarto for the first time in the Mathis Brothers.

Owned by the Little Red Feather Racing partnership and Marsha Naify, Scarto has won 4 of 9 starts and has earned $159,788. Scarto won the American Fabius Stakes at Gulfstream Park last February in his final start for trainer Amador Sanchez.

Trained by Mike Puype since the spring, Scarto was second in the Grade 2 Twilight Derby at 1 1/8 miles on turf at Santa Anita in October, and was sixth in the Grade 1 Hollywood Derby at 1 1/8 miles on turf at Del Mar on Nov. 28, finishing 3 1/2 lengths behind Domestic Spending. Smooth Like Strait, a leading candidate in the Mathis Brothers Mile, was second by a head.

“It was a super tough race,” Puype said Sunday. “Those were really good horses. This race comes up a little easier than the race at Del Mar.”

Aside from Smooth Like Strait, the Mathis Brothers field includes the multiple stakes winner Field Pass, who was third in the Twilight Derby and won the Grade 3 Ontario Derby at Woodbine on Nov. 21.