Rapid Rhythm looks to cap career in style in Pan Zareta

If Rapid Rhythm is racing for the last time Saturday, she’ll take her final full-out strides over a turf course that has served her exceedingly well.

Six times Rapid Rhythm has gone to the post on the Fair Grounds grass, and six times she subsequently has visited the winner’s circle. The 6-year-old is slated to become a broodmare this winter, and she can run her local record to 7 for 7 on Saturday in the $50,000 Pan Zareta Stakes, which is expected to be her final race.

“They are planning on breeding her, and just because of a lack of other races to go in, this probably is her last start,” said trainer Mike Stidham.

What Stidham’s getting at is that Rapid Rhythm is showing no sign of decline. The mare, a Virginia-bred by Successful Appeal owned by Robert Evans, has been lightly raced, with just 23 starts behind her. The most recent came Dec. 2 at Fair Grounds, where Rapid Rhythm went from sixth at the top of the stretch to first at the stretch call and won the second division of the Richard Scherer Memorial Stakes by a half-length.

The race went in a slower time than the Scherer’s first division, whose winner, Chanteline, is not part of the Pan Zareta’s full field, but Rapid Rhythm’s division was assigned a higher Beyer Speed Figure because, according to Andy Beyer, a slow pace prevented Rapid Rhythm from running a true final figure. Her 88 Beyer therefore is a projected number meant to better signify her actual ability.

A second Stidham-trained horse in the Pan Zareta, One Last Shot, finished second to Chanteline while running a faster raw time than Rapid Rhythm, but One Last Shot got an 85 Beyer. That number did equal her career best, and One Last Shot, with just a handful of turf-sprint tries in her career, still has upside in races like Saturday’s.

“We were glad to get her back sprinting on the grass last time,” Stidham said. “She seems to like the turf course here, and I think she’ll come back and run a similar race.”

Among the 11 entrants in the field’s main body (there are three also-eligibles) is a pair of 4-year-olds who appear to have enough upside to step forward and win. Excessivespending was scratched from a division of the Scherer in order to run in a second-level turf-sprint allowance race Dec. 10, which she won by more than three lengths in an eye-catching performance. Excessivespending floundered on a soggy Churchill course last fall, but otherwise has shown nothing but talent in limited turf-sprint experience.

Contributing finished second to Rapid Rhythm in the second Scherer division and probably ran nearly as well as the winner. Contributing broke from post 1 and was locked inside for much of the trip, only coming out for run after Rapid Rhythm had bounded past to take the lead.