Sunday TimeformUS Highlight Horse: Mursal sitting on improved effort for Dutrow

Aqueduct | Race 4 | Post Time 1:48 p.m. (ET)

Coppa Girl (#3) figures to be a clear-cut favorite as she seems to break through at this level for Brad Cox after finishing second in 3 of her last 4 attempts at this condition. She comes out of a couple of races in which she earned TimeformUS Speed Figures that make her a bit faster than her rivals. The effort two back seems legitimate, but there are some reasons to be critical of her last effort. We have seen multiple horses from that Dec. 16 allowance event return to regress in their next starts, including winner She’s Mo Bubbly. I also didn’t like that Coppa Girl got run down on that occasion, considering that she was allowed to control a slow pace. The slight cutback to a mile might suit her, but I didn’t want to take her at a short price given those disappointments.

Her main rival appears to be the returning Pharoah’s Heart (#6), who hasn’t raced since last June. The Pace Projector is predicting a scenario favoring the early leader, and this mare is expected to control the pace from her outside draw. It’s easy to forgive the experiment on turf last time, and she had previously been keeping solid company on dirt, earning speed figures that make her competitive here. I’m just a little concerned that she might not be ready to fire her best race off the bench, especially considering that she’s in for a $50k tag here.

My top pick is Mursal (#5). She’s stretching back out to a mile after a couple of seven-furlong races, but she’s certainly capable of getting this distance. She’s not as fast as the two favorites from a speed figure standpoint, but she’s given subtle signs that she’s improving in her recent starts. She ran deceptively well last time, waiting in traffic on the turn and making good progress up the rail through the stretch in a race where the winner looped the field. We saw Starship Defiant come back to win earlier this week off a similar trip, and Mursal was finishing better than that rival through the late stages. She should be able to sit closer to the pace from this outside draw, and the price should be fair enough for a dangerous barn.