Sunny One gets another bite out of second-level allowance condition

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Vince Cheminaud has won just two races from limited mounts this year, and yet the 27-year-old Frenchman started this week with a robust $3.42 ROI in 2022. One of those two winners, Sunny One, returns Thursday at Churchill Downs, entered for the same “two-other-than” allowance condition for which the 4-year-old filly won last month.

Sunny One, claimed 14 months ago by Conor Murphy for Midnight Racing Stables, was still eligible for a first-level condition when Cheminaud guided her to an 18-1 upset April 24 on the Keeneland turf. Cheminaud’s only other win from 26 starts this year came the same week at the Keeneland spring meet, with a 24-1 shot named Shannon.

Sunny One won’t return such a fat mutuel should she win right back from post 8 in an oversubscribed lineup of fillies and mares. Her last-out score by 1 3/4 lengths came against three others also entered back in race 7, a 1 1/16-mile turf race with a maximum purse of $134,000.

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Cheminaud brings a rich background from his homeland, having won 665 races there, most notably the 2015 French Derby on New Bayfor the legendary Andre Fabre. His agent, Steve Bass, has worked this circuit for more than a quarter-century, including 15 years with Julien Leparoux, another French native.

Five others in the Thursday feature exit a race won by Petricor on the same April 24 card at Keeneland, and it all makes for some deep-dive handicapping. Flatter Me Silly, beaten just a neck for all the money when third in that race, is among that fivesome. In all, 13 are entered, with Russian Mafia being the lone also-eligible.

Thursday begins a four-day race week (Thursday through Sunday) that’s the springtime norm at Churchill, with all Thursdays being eight-race twilight cards that start at 5 p.m. Eastern. The latter portion of those programs will be run under the lights, with the last race going at 8:23.

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One earlier allowance (race 3) also is part of this card. Its purse also maxes out at $134,000, with a field of six 3-year-old fillies going six furlongs on the main track for a “never-won-three” condition. Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen holds a strong hand with the uncoupled pair of Pinky Toe (post 3, Brian Hernandez Jr.) and Parlance (post 6, Julien Leparoux), with both having won first-level allowances at the recently ended Oaklawn Park meet.

A 50 percent rain chance and a daytime high of 85 are in the local forecast.