Speedsters ripe for Demarcation

Second-year management at Kentucky Downs tinkered with the stakes schedule for 2008, with the result being $50,000 stakes anchoring the two Monday cards at the turf-only track. The first one, the Franklin-Simpson Stakes, drew a speed-laden field that would seem to set things up for Demarcation, a stakes-seasoned 4-year-old who appears likely to be sent away a lukewarm favorite in a field of seven entered in the one-mile race.

Jamie Theriot has the mount on Demarcation, whose three most recent efforts all resulted in third-place finishes. Two of those races were turf stakes at Arlington Park, and a repeat of his two-back rally in the $150,000 Sea o' Erin would seem more than sufficient here Monday. The pace figures to be made to his order, what with speedsters such as Voy Por Uno Mas, St. Joe, Devil's Attitude, and Diamond Lure likely to set sail.

The Franklin-Simpson is the eighth of nine races on a Monday card that begins at 1:30 p.m. Central. Seven races are carded here Tuesday. The $50,000 Pleasant Temper Stakes, to be run next Monday, Sept. 22, will be the final stakes of the six-day meet.

* One of the most noteworthy aspects to the opening of the Kentucky Downs meet is this: Trainer Wesley Ward appears to be launching an all-out assault. From the 23 races carded during the first three days, Ward has at least one entry in 11 of them, with many of the horses having raced most recently at Saratoga. Ward is scheduled to have runners in four races Monday and four Tuesday.