Rosie's Halo likely will be favored

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Christmas week will begin slowly and pick up steam heading into and through the holiday weekend with the opening of the 2022-23 Championship meet only five days away, on Monday, Dec. 26.

Wednesday’s card offers only eight races topped by a modest $54,000 allowance test for Florida-bred fillies and mares to be run at seven furlongs over the main track. But there is plenty of stakes action in the near future, with Saturday’s Christmas Eve program featuring both the $100,000 Janus and its filly counterpart, the $100,000 Abundantia going five furlongs on the turf. The much anticipated Championship session lid-lifter will be highlighted by the $100,000 Tropical Park Derby and Tropical Park Oaks.

Handicappers will likely settle on trainer Saffie Joseph Jr.’s Rosie’s Halo as the favorite in Wednesday’s main event following her a third-place finish against similarly conditioned opposition going six furlongs on Oct. 2, a key race won by Alluramore, who came right back to flatter the effort by defeating open allowance competition in relatively easy fashion in her next start. Rosie’s Halo has not been off the board in four career outings and finished a game second following a prolonged pace duel when trying seven panels for the first and only time here this summer.

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Adios Baby also figures to attract plenty of support exiting a second-place finish with the same kind just 19 days earlier. She held on tenaciously for second money after chasing Joseph’s 2-1 favorite, wire-to-wire winner Anna’s Dream, from the outset. Adios Baby gave Rosie’s Halo all she could handle before dropping a tough neck decision when the pair met for the first time, as maidens, on Aug. 21.

The improving Twirling Grace, who was re-claimed by her current connections for $12,500 on Sept. 23, tops the remainder of a field that also includes Dion Magic, Frankly My Dear, Awesome Annmarie, and More Glory.

Repeat attempts

Miss J McKay and Carotari will return to defend their titles in the Abundantia and Janus.

Miss J McKay will face nine rivals, including old nemesis Miss Auramet, in the Abundantia. Miss J McKay has been idle since a disappointing eighth-place finish in the Sensible Lady Turf Dash at Pimlico three months earlier.

Carotari is part of a loaded field of a dozen male turf sprinter specialists entered for the Janus. He has been freshened since winning the Laurel Dash on Sept. 24. The Janus also features the two-time grass sprint stakes winner Nothing Better and Scaramouche, who upset the Grade 2 Gallant Bob at Parx earlier this fall but will be making his turf debut Saturday.

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◗ After going unsolved for the better part of a month until taken down to the tune of a $358,032 payoff on Wednesday, the Rainbow 6 was solved again here Sunday. The lone ticket on the winning combination returned $137,119.41. Earlier on the card, the opening pick five sequence, capped off by the 28-1 winner Braccio di Ferro, paid $94,330.60.

◗ Management has amended an earlier policy regarding the cancellation of five-furlong turf races beginning with the opening of the Championship meet.

Horsemen have been advised that all non-statebred maiden special weight and allowance races written at five furlongs on the Tapeta surface in the new condition book (Dec. 26 through Jan. 29) will now be offered as five-furlong turf races with an alternate distance of five furlongs Tapeta.

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