Uncle D top contender in wide-open Rainbow Futurity

Uncle D was bought for $170,000 at the Heritage Place Quarter Horse yearling sale in Oklahoma City last September. The colt needed three races to earn that sum for owner Don Cavenaugh.

Uncle D was second in the $1,073,100 Heritage Place Futurity at Remington Park on June 1 in his stakes debut. Sunday at Ruidoso Downs, Uncle D starts in his second seven-figure race, the $1 million Rainbow Futurity at 400 yards.

There will not be a sweep of the three seven-figure futurities at Ruidoso Downs this summer. Fernweh, who won the Ruidoso Futurity on June 9, did not start in the Rainbow Futurity time trials on July 5-6. The five fastest qualifiers from each trial day earned berths in Sunday’s final.

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All 10 qualifiers were trial race winners. Uncle D, trained by Clinton Crawford, was timed in 19.79 seconds, setting the fourth-fastest time on July 6. The colt has earned $177,365 in three starts.

Crawford thinks Uncle D can improve from the trial race performance, the colt’s first start at Ruidoso’s altitude of 6,900 feet.

“I thought he flattened a little bit at the end of the trial race,” he said Thursday. “I think he needed the race.”

Cody Smith, who was aboard for the Heritage Place Futurity and the Rainbow trial, has the mount.

Uncle D is rated as a leading contender along with the filly Hotsempting and the colt DF Mischievious Jess.

Hotsempting, trained by Jose Muela, was seventh in the $1 million Ruidoso Futurity after a slow start and set the fastest qualifying time of 19.51 from the July 5 trials.

DF Mischievious Jess, trained by James Padgett, was third in the $100,000 Heritage Place Juvenile, the consolation of the futurity, and was timed in 19.75 from his trial win on July 5.

Hotsempting is one of five fillies in the Rainbow field. The filly Valiant Astica set the fastest qualifying time of 19.69 on July 6, winning for the first time in her fourth start.

Trained by Fred Danley, Valiant Astica was a troubled fourth in a division of the Ruidoso Futurity trials on May 25.

“She had a lot of trouble and still finished fourth,” Danley said Thursday. “I knew this filly could get it done if it would all go right.”

Valiant Astica is considered a longshot in a Rainbow Futurity unlikely to have a heavy favorite.

Post time is 4:45 p.m. Mountain.