Somelikeithotbrown's connections ponder next move

Having secured only 20 Kentucky Derby qualifying points in winning Saturday’s Grade 3, $200,000 Jeff Ruby Steaks at Turfway Park, Somelikeithotbrown is below the customary threshold of around 30 points that is typically required to gain entrance to the May 4 race, though he will receive a chance to add to his total in the weeks ahead.

Trainer Mike Maker said Sunday that the colt emerged from the race in good condition, and his owners, Skychai Racing and Sand Dollar stable, are considering all of the final Kentucky Derby preps as a means for him to run his way into the Derby. If they opt for one of the major qualifiers, which offer points on a 100-40-20-10 scale for the first-through-fourth finishers, a third-place finish or better would give him enough points to make the Derby based on precedent. A fourth-place finish, providing 10 points, would put him on the bubble.

One of his owners, Harvey Diamond, may hold the horse to an even higher standard if he is to go on.

“If you’re not first or second in your last prep race, the Derby doesn’t make the most sense,” he said Sunday. “I don’t want to run in another Derby to say we ran in the Derby. I don’t want to knock him out.”

Whether he and his partners, Jim Shircliff and David Koenig, continue to feel this way when Derby decision time comes is another matter. Few are immune to Derby Fever.

According to Diamond, the owners want to weigh the competition before deciding on Somelikeithotbrown’s next race, though the Grade 2, $1 million Blue Grass on April 6 at Keeneland would seem the most likely spot. Diamond and the other owners are from Kentucky, as is Maker.

If all goes according to plan, his next race will be on dirt, a surface on which Somelikeithotbrown has raced just once previously, finishing seventh in the slop when debuting in a 5 1/2-furlong race at Saratoga last summer.

Maker said the horse would remain at Turfway Park to train before potentially moving to Churchill Downs Trackside or Keeneland in a few weeks.

Somelikeithotbrown received a preliminary Beyer Speed Figure of 83 for his frontrunning, 3 1/4-length victory in the Jeff Ruby. This was an equivalent figure to that of last year’s winner, Blended Citizen, who later ran fifth in the Blue Grass, first in the Grade 3 Peter Pan, and then ninth in the Grade 1 Belmont Stakes.

Other stakes winners from Jeff Ruby day are being targeted for stakes at Keeneland. Trainer Wesley Ward said Sunday that Bourbonette winner Naughty Joker is being considered for the Grade 1 Ashland at Keeneland, “pending the boss’s approval” – meaning Ken Ramsey, who co-owns her with his wife, Sarah.

Although Naughty Joker earned just a 65 Beyer in winning the Bourbonette, a Kentucky Oaks qualifier that awarded her 20 points, Ward holds her in high regard.

"Really, to be quite honest, it wasn’t as much her race yesterday that impressed me as much as what the filly does daily,” he said.

Naughty Joker was one of three stakes winners on the afternoon for Ward, all with Rafael Bejarano aboard, with the others being Animal Kingdom winner Hawaiian Noises and Rushaway winner Onthewaytonevrland. They are also being aimed at Keeneland: Hawaiian Noises for the April 13 Lexington Stakes at 1 1/16 miles on dirt and Onthewaytonevrland for the April 5 Transylvania at 1 1/16 miles on turf.

A promising effort against graded foes in the Grade 3 Transylvania could make Onthewaytonevrland a candidate for Royal Ascot’s Commonwealth Stakes, Ward said.