Top older horses clash in Spencer Childers Championship
In the last year, Black Fryday, He Looks Hot, and Tarzanito have won six-figure stakes at 400 yards at Los Alamitos.
They meet for the first time in Saturday’s $100,000 Spencer Childers Championship for California-breds at the same distance in a race that often provides clues for the major races for older Quarter Horses in the second half of the year.
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The year-end goal is the $600,000 Champion of Champions at Los Alamitos on Dec. 14. He Looks Hot and Tarzanito were sixth and ninth in the 2018 Champion of Champions.
All have something to prove in the Childers. Black Fryday won the $162,850 Southern California Derby last December, but is winless in two starts this year. He was fractious in the gate before a division of the Vessels Maturity trials on June 16 and did not qualify for the final.
Tarzanito, the champion aged stallion of 2018, won a division of the Vessels trials and was sixth by 1 3/4 lengths in the $155,100 final on July 7 against an outstanding field. Tarzanito won the $100,000 Go Man Go Handicap last September.
He Looks Hot won the $125,000 Los Alamitos Winter Championship last October and was fourth by a length in the Vessels Maturity to Katies Easy Moves, who is not part of the Childers field.
The Childers is the 10th race on a 12-race program that concludes with three six-figure races.
Powerful Favorite, the leading 3-year-old male at Los Alamitos this year, will be a strong favorite to win the $195,000 Governor’s Cup Derby at 400 yards. Trained by Chris O’Dell, Powerful Favorite won the Los Alamitos Winter Derby in February and the El Primero Del Ano Derby in March.
The Governor’s Cup Derby field includes Cole Man 47, who won the Pacific Coast Quarter Horse Racing Association Breeders’ Futurity last October. Cole Man 47 and Powerful Favorite were easy winners of time trials for the Governor’s Cup Derby on July 14.
The richest race of the evening is the last – the $365,000 Governor’s Cup Futurity at 350 yards. The field of 10 includes two full-brothers - Lebowski and Pit Bull, who are by Favorite Cartel and out of Separate Tac, who won the 2006 All American Derby at Ruidoso Downs.
Lebowski and Pit Bull were bred via embryo transfer, according to breeder Steve Burns. Both were trial race winners on July 13. Pitbull had the fastest qualifying time of 17.67 seconds. O’Dell starts Runforyourlife, who won a time trial in 17.68 seconds.