V.E. Day gives Lezcano 2,000th win in Curlin Stakes
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Trainer Jimmy Jerkens was certain V.E. Day would get the distance, pretty sure V.E. Day would handle the surface, and thought V.E. Day was classy enough to win Friday’s $100,000 Curlin Stakes at Saratoga.
He was right on all three counts.
V.E. Day, last out of the gate and last until the five-sixteenths pole, rallied five wide in the stretch under Jose Lezcano and, despite failing to switch to his correct lead in the stretch, outfinished Charge Now to win the Curlin by a head. Charge Now, a half-brother to Kentucky Derby winner Super Saver, got second by a nose over 3-1 favorite Protonico. He was followed, in order, by Viva Majorca, Spot, Joint Custody, Life in Shambles, Tiz’naz, and Cousin Stephen. Commanding Curve scratched to run in Saturday’s Grade 2, $600,000 Jim Dandy Stakes.
The win was the third straight for V.E. Day, a son of English Channel owned by Magalen Bryant, and first in a stakes race. It was also his first start on a fast dirt track. V.E. Day’s only other race on dirt was a maiden win in the slop on May 10 at Belmont Park.
The win also was jockey Jose Lezcano’s 2,000th career victory in North America.
The victory could earn V.E. Day a start in the $1.25 million Travers Stakes on Aug. 23. Of course, Jerkens hopes to have another starter in that race, Wood Memorial winner Wicked Strong, who will start in Saturday’s Jim Dandy.
“They all don’t want to go a mile and a quarter,” Jerkens said, adding V.E. Day “looks like he wants to do it, so you got to seriously think about it.”
V.E. Day had proven himself a 1 1/8-mile horse with a two-length victory in a turf allowance on July 2 at Belmont. Jerkens loved the way he worked over the dirt course here on July 19 when he went seven furlongs in 1:27.40 around two turns.
“He couldn’t have worked any better a far as moving nice and even all the way and we decided to give it a shot,” Jerkens said.
As an added bonus, the Curlin came up a race loaded with front-running types. And, the race developed as such with Tiz’naz, Joint Custody, and Life in Shambles - who acted up in the gate - going for the lead into the first turn though the first quarter was run in a modest 24.06 seconds.
The pace picked up down the backside but Lezcano bided his time. He maneuvered between horses leaving the five-sixteenths pole, tipped widest of all in the stretch, and gradually joined and wore down Charge Now and Protonico, the latter making the lead on an a deft inside move by Javier Castellano.
V.E. Day covered the 1 1/8 miles in 1:50.51 and returned $18.20 to win.
“My horse do everything so easy to the quarter pole,” Lezcano, 29, said. “When I go to the lead in the last three-sixteenths, he kind of got lost a little bit.”
Lezcano said the fact Charge Now was directly to his inside and moving helped his horse to “keep running” to the wire.
Lezcano, a native of Panama, rode his first North American winner at Gulfstream on March 14, 2003. Along the way to 2,000 victories he rode two-time Horse of the Year Wise Dan to three victories, including last year’s Breeders’ Cup Mile. He was also the regular rider of Royal Delta during her 3-year-old championship season, which included a victory in the Alabama here.
Winning to 2,000 races “means a lot to me,” Lezcano said.
While Jerkens will wait to decide whether to run back in the Travers, Bill Mott, the trainer of runner-up Charge Now, seemed liked he would like to run his horse back in the Mid-Summer Derby in four weeks.
“I would like to, a mile and a quarter,” Mott said. “He,” Mott added, referring to jockey Junior Alvarado, “said he was a little green when the horse went by him. He kind of hesitated and then came back again.”