Roll On Big Joe holds off Dr. Venkman in Kelly's Landing
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LOUISVILLE, Ky. – On May 16, Roll On Big Joe could have been claimed for $175,000. He wasn’t, and six weeks later the 5-year-old gelding won the Grade 3, $220,000 Kelly’s Landing on Saturday at Churchill Downs.
Trainer Bob Hess Jr. and owners Rancho Temescal, White Fence, and Richard Hale Jr. took a mild risk running the accomplished sprinter for a high tag, since claiming has been rampant on the rich Kentucky circuit, but no one bit, and Roll On Big Joe probably ran the best race of his career in the Kelly’s Landing.
California-bred Roll On Big Joe’s connections owe a debt of gratitude to French-bred jockey Julien Leparoux, who gave his mount a fine ride, perfectly balancing the need to keep pacesetting Booth from getting an easy lead and to keep his mount from getting into a speed duel.
Roll On Big Joe broke on top before Booth pushed forward inside him to go an opening quarter-mile in a moderate 22.33. Leparoux cat-and-moused to the half-mile pole before sneaking closer approaching the three-eighths pole; Roll On Big Joe looked like he was going better than Booth, and he was.
Roll On Big Joe took Booth’s measure at the three-sixteenths marker, forged to the front, and then got a further assist from jockey Jose Ortiz. Dr. Venkman, the 8-5 favorite over 9-5 Booth, broke from the rail, got into the pocket, kept up with the pacesetters despite never getting fully comfortable, and came off the fence under Antonio Fresu just about the time Roll On Big Joe seized the lead.
Fresu went for a gap between Roll On Big Joe and Durante, who’d stalked the pace from the outside, but Ortiz, aboard Durante, was having none of that. He held his spot and pushed Dr. Venkman back down inside, and while Dr. Venkman regained momentum and finished with interest, passing the eventual third-place finisher Durante, he fell a half-length short of victory as Booth faded to fourth.
Roll On Big Joe ran 6 1/2 furlongs over a fast track in 1:15.22 and paid $11.90 to win. The gelding is by Prospective out of Nina’s Gift, by Victory Gallop, and he won for the seventh time in 17 starts. Just a one-time winner in his first seven outings, Roll On Big Joe finally found himself last year at age 4 and peaked this past February winning the Grade 3 Palos Verdes by four lengths. He finished second in April as an odds-on favorite in a Keeneland allowance race, a start in which, Hess said, the gelding bled slightly.
It was after that subpar performance that connections ran the gelding under claiming conditions here last month. He won that race, wasn’t claimed, earned about $120,000 Saturday, and could be headed for the $400,000 Bing Crosby on July 26 at Del Mar. That six-furlong contest is a Grade 1, which means little for a horse gelded in February 2024. It’s probably no coincidence that the gelding preceded Roll On Big Joe’s step up to a new level. In another universe, he might still be an entire horse doing these same things. In this one, he’s a hard-trying gelding who wasn’t claimed in mid-May and won the Kelly’s Landing six weeks later.
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