Several good ones remain for South Beach

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - The popular conception is that all of the good horses and major outfits have already departed south Florida for the season. It's a notion that can be proven false simply by looking at the starting lineup for Saturday's $50,000 South Beach Stakes, which lured a full field of 14 fillies and mares, including Grade 2 winner Raw Silk, Group 2 winner All Is Vanity, and the recently graded stakes-placed Flibberjibit.

The South Beach, the penultimate race on the 2009 Gulfstream Park stakes schedule, will be decided at 7 1/2 furlongs on the turf.

Trainer Tom Albertrani can cap off an outstanding meet with his sixth stakes victory of the session should Raw Silk prevail in the South Beach. Raw Silk won the Grade 2 Sands Point and also led into the stretch in a pair of Grade 1 races during her 3-year-old campaign. However, she has not started since finishing eighth in the Grade 2 Mrs. Revere on Nov. 8 at Churchill Downs.

All Is Vanity also will be coming off an extended layoff when she makes her first start since finishing third in the Grade 3 Violet in mid-October at the Meadowlands. A daughter of Gold Away, All Is Vanity won a Group 2 stakes in her native France at 3 and has captured 2 of her 5 starts since coming to the United States and under the tutelage of trainer Christophe Clement early last year.

Flibberjibit is a win machine, having captured 6 of her last 11 starts dating back to summer 2008. Purchased privately by Farnsworth Stable LLC following her 2008 finale, Flibberjibit registered a pair of easy allowance victories here this winter before earning her first black type with a third-place finish under Javier Castellano in the Grade 3 Honey Fox.

"She probably made the lead a little too soon in her last start, but that was my fault," trainer Marty Wolfson said. "I told Javier to get the jump on the filly who won the race, which he did. But in the end, it wouldn't have mattered. She'd have never beaten that horse anyway."

Wolfson was referring to I Lost My Choo, who rallied to a two-length triumph in the Honey Fox.

American Border, who defeated All Is Vanity in the Violet in her final start at 4, had a four-race win streak snapped when she finished 11th in the Grade 3 Endeavour on Feb. 14 at Tampa Bay Downs.