Santa Anita: Majestic City at distance limit in Friday allowance

ARCADIA, Calif. – Majestic City is a horse with a distance dilemma.

He is effective at distances up to 1 1/16 miles, which made Saturday’s $300,000 San Antonio Stakes over 1 1/8 miles a stretch. Trainer Ron Ellis found a substitute in a $60,000 allowance race over a mile on Friday, and was not alone in his thinking. Three other horses nominated for the Grade 2 San Antonio – Batti Man, Battier, and Fury Kapcori – are in the allowance race.

Majestic City won the Big Bear Stakes over a mile here last October, but is winless in his last two starts, both at 1 1/16 miles. Majestic City was second in the Grade 3 Berkeley Handicap at Golden Gate Fields on Nov. 29, and fourth in the Grade 2 San Pasqual Stakes here on Jan. 11.

“This is where he belongs,” Ellis said of Friday’s race. “It’s hard to get races to fill. A mile and a sixteenth is as far as he wants to run. A mile is what he wants, and they don’t have many of them.”

Owned by Bloom Racing Stable, Majestic City has won 4 of 18 starts and earned $377,760. He is best when racing near the front, and in the San Pasqual he raced in third early then fell to the back of the field on the far turn.

“He never got comfortable,” Ellis said. “They weren’t going fast. At one point, he dropped back to last.”

Jockey Mike Smith rides Majestic City for the first time on Friday. The race drew a field of seven, including the 2013 stakes winner Battier and the 2012 stakes winners Fury Kapcori and Midnight Transfer.

Battier, who won the Fit to Fight Stakes at Aqueduct last April, was trained by Todd Pletcher for most of 2013, which included a third in the Grade 2 Pennsylvania Derby. A 4-year-old, Battier is trained by Michael McCarthy, a former assistant to Pletcher who is building his own stable in California.

Fury Kapcori is the only runner in the race with a victory in his last start. Fury Kapcori, fifth in the Pennsylvania Derby last September, won an optional claimer over 1 1/16 miles here on Jan. 1, disputing the lead throughout.

It is a style Fury Kapcori prefers, according to Dan Ward, trainer Jerry Hollendorfer’s assistant.

“If you get him going head-to-head, he likes it,” Ward said.