Santa Anita: Chips All In holds off Boat Trip in Eddie D

ARCADIA, Calif. - Chips All In won his second stakes of 2013 on Santa Anita’s hillside turf course in Friday’s $101,750 Eddie D Stakes, holding off a late run from Boat Trip to prevail by a nose.

Despite Chips All In’s affection for the course, trainer Jeff Mullins said after the race that Chips All In is unlikely to run in the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint on the hillside course on Nov. 2. Chips All In is not nominated to the Breeders’ Cup program and would need to be made eligible.

Ridden by Julien Leparoux, Chips All In had a favorable trip in the Grade 3 Eddie D. Third on the hillside in pursuit of pacesetters Rosengold and Snowday through an early pace of 21.73 and 43.66 seconds, Chips All In moved closer to the front when the field crossed the dirt onto the main turf course. Chips All In trailed Snowday by a half-length with a furlong remaining, took the lead in the final sixteenth, and held on, finishing about 6 1/2 furlongs in 1:12. He paid $7.80 to win.

“Julien kind of pushed him away from there,” Mullins said. “I said, ‘Don’t give him too much to do.’ He sat quiet and he went.”

Boat Trip finished a half-length in front Unbridled’s Note, the winner of the 2012 Eddie D. Caracortado, making his first start since February 2012, ran well to finish fourth.

Jockey Garrett Gomez said that Boat Trip jumped the dirt at the crossing, which affected the colt’s momentum.

Snowday finished fifth, followed by El Mirage King, Rock Me Baby, Et Tu Walker, Rosengold, Huntsville, Sirocco Strike and Majestic City.

Chips All In, a 4-year-old colt by North Light, has won 7 of 16 starts and $410,613. In April of this year, Chips All In won the Grade 3 San Simeon Handicap on the hillside turf course. He was second by a nose to Unbridled’s Note in the Joe Hernandez Stakes on the hillside course in February.

Chips All In races for Jean Everest, John O’Brien, Danny Valdez and Michelle Turpin. The Eddie D Stakes was Chips All In’s fifth career stakes win.