Surveillance possible despite lengthy layoff

Barring a dead heat, one among four of the 10 entrants in Friday’s featured eighth race will lose for the first time at Fair Grounds.

The leading candidate is Midnight Escape, a 30-1 shot in this six-furlong sprint that has two allowance conditions (nonwinners of three “other than” and nonwinners of a race in the last six months) and an $80,000 claiming option. Pro Oxidant is 2 for 2 and a viable chance at a fair price, with bettors likely to gravitate toward Surveillance and even more so Corona Bolt.

Surveillance is 5 for 5 at Fair Grounds and last season ran off stakes wins in the Thanksgiving Classic, the Richie Scherer Memorial, and the Duncan Kenner. Only in the Duncan Kenner was Surveillance favored, and he won’t be the favorite Friday. That’s partly because 7-year-old Surveillance hasn’t started since July 1, and his form had tailed off when he went to the sidelines. You can bet trainer Keith Desormeaux would’ve prepared Surveillance for the $200,000 Thanksgiving Classic if it had been possible, since that is the only older-horse dirt sprint stakes during this entire Fair Grounds meet.

Is Surveillance ready for his comeback? Possibly. He has worked six times starting Nov. 25, and the two Fair Grounds five-furlong gate drills showing on his pattern were very much stamina-oriented. Surveillance, James Graham up, went in company with an unraced 3-year-old maiden named Air It Out. On Dec. 23, Surveillance was officially given a clocking of 1:01 for five furlongs, but the work went on for the better part of one mile, Graham driving his mount to the half-mile pole. The Jan. 13 drill was of similar length but unfolded differently. Surveillance was sharper out of the gate and faster in the early stages but appeared to tire late. And the fact that he was given a work of that nature six days before his start suggests Surveillance might need this outing.

Corona Bolt figures to be close to an odds-on favorite for trainer Brad Cox and jockey Florent Geroux, despite the fact he never has faced older horses and hasn’t raced since April. As a late 2-year-old, Corona Bolt won the Sugar Bowl at Fair Grounds by almost seven lengths, earning a flashy 97 Beyer Speed Figure. He captured the Lafayette at Keeneland in April and worked three times afterward but only now makes his first post-Lafayette start.

“He just wasn’t moving good,” Cox said. “We gave him plenty of time off. Physically, he looks unbelievable now. He’s solid, probably about 90 percent fit. We felt this was a really good race to get him started.”

Corona Bolt is all speed and might tangle on the lead with two fast but inferior horses drawn to his inside, Bridleuptothebarn and Saint Selby. At the expected short price, he’s hard to support.

Pro Oxidant ran below his best form in his two most recent races in Kentucky but thrived last winter at Fair Grounds and has been working with good energy. He’ll be third choice in the Friday feature and just might run his Fair Grounds record to 3 for 3.

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