Smile Happy returns to the work tab
Smile Happy started his 3-year-old campaign looking like a serious 2022 Kentucky Derby hope. His 3-year-old season ended after a tepid eighth-place finish in the Derby, and Smile Happy posted his first timed workout since April when he went three furlongs in 37.60 seconds on Dec. 31 at Fair Grounds.
Trainer Kenny McPeek said Smile Happy was taken out of training with distal bone bruising following the Derby.
“He wasn’t jogging off clean,” he said. “We gave him some time, brought him back, and he still wasn’t jogging off clean, so we gave him some more time and now he seems to be back to his old self.”
Smile Happy went 2 for 2 at age 2, winning the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club. In his first start at 3, he finished a somewhat troubled second behind Epicenter in the Risen Star Stakes at Fair Grounds. McPeek said Smile Happy could return to racing in March if all went well.
Smile Happy is among several stakes-class 4-year-olds training in New Orleans for McPeek. Tiz the Bomb, ninth in the Derby, hasn’t started since he finished fourth as the favorite in the Hall of Fame Stakes on Aug. 5. He’s logged four works at Fair Grounds and could be ready for the Fair Grounds Stakes on Feb. 18. Yet to work is Rattle N Roll, winner of the St. Louis Derby and Oklahoma Derby last year. Also training at Fair Grounds is 4-year-old filly Butterbean, who won the Iowa Oaks last summer.
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