Tight turns should suit Pendleton in Bosselman Stakes

Pendleton cost $600,000 at auction and started his career in the summer of 2017 debuting for trainer Chad Brown in a Saratoga maiden race. You couldn’t say that things turned out as originally hoped for Pendleton, but they’ve turned out all right.

Pendleton made that one Saratoga start, finishing sixth, and when he turned back up 13 months later he was with trainer Justin Evans at Zia Park. Pendleton since has won 8 of 14 starts and nearly $250,000, and Evans has brought him from his Sunland Park base to start as the favorite Wednesday in the $50,000 Bosselman Pump and Pantry/Gus Fonner Stakes.

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Pendleton, one of 10 entrants in the 1 1/16-mile fixture run around three turns, is set to break from post 9 under Francisco Arrieta as Evans’s first Fonner starter. Evans had toyed with running in the Bosselman for a few months after Pendleton excelled over the bullring racetrack at SunRay Park last year, and with no local suitable spots available after the coronavirus pandemic halted New Mexico racing in mid-March, the trip to Fonner became an easy choice.

Pendleton, who can deploy tactical speed as needed, won two stakes and an allowance race by nearly 30 combined lengths late last spring at SunRay. The track there is six furlongs in circumference compared to five furlongs at Fonner, and SunRay last May was playing far faster than Fonner has been in recent weeks. Still, Pendleton’s obvious fondness for a tight-turning track makes him the one to beat in the Bosselman.

“This is a different track than SunRay,” Evans said Monday. “It was real banked-up turns when we came up to train on it yesterday, but he galloped around there good.”

Pendleton hasn’t started since Feb. 9, when he finished second at Sunland in the Winsham Lad, and shows only one three-furlong work for this comeback start. But there hasn’t been a daily clocker at Sunland in weeks, and Evans said Pendleton has worked several times, including an encouraging six-furlong drill. Moreover, Pendleton had been entered in the Bill Thomas Stakes on March 22, a race that wound up being canceled, and thus has been race-fit for weeks.

“We haven’t missed a day of training with him,” Evans said.

Sleepy Eyes Todd, who was second to Owendale in the Oklahoma Derby last fall, figures to attract more betting than his 5-1 morning line, but he makes his bullring debut Wednesday after shipping from Houston. Trainer Doug O’Neill has sent Fight On from Oaklawn Park, but Fight On ran very poorly at Oaklawn following a four-start campaign in Dubai this winter.

Fight On could show speed Wednesday as could rail-drawn Taruca and a couple other entrants, and the more pace the better for top local hope Mr. Tickle. Mr. Tickle finished second to stablemate and fellow Bosselman entrant Blue Harbor in the Dowd Mile on April 1, but Mr. Tickle found some trouble that day just as Blue Harbor was getting away, and trainer Marissa Black has been aiming Mr. Tickle to the Bosselman since she brought him to Fonner in March.

Mr. Tickle won a Fonner allowance race before his Dowd Mile second and has six victories and two second-place finishes since Black claimed him for just $5,000 last August.

“He’s been a once-in-a-lifetime claim, really,” Black said. “I can’t say enough about the horse. He really likes the distance, and I thought the bullring would really suit his style.”

Mr. Tickle is 8-1 on the morning line and figures to be overlooked in favor of some flashier shippers. He’s got a home-court advantage and should be the right price to bet in the biggest race of the Fonner meeting.

◗ Eaton’s Memory will be difficult to topple in the $15,000 Al Swihart Memorial, the supporting feature earlier on the card.