W W Candy goes last to first in Work All Week Handicap

W W Candy, who raced for a claiming price as low as $8,500 in 2021, went last to first, overcoming trouble, to win the $75,000 Work All Week Handicap on Thursday evening at Hawthorne Racecourse.

Under Abel Lezcano, W W Candy ran down 9-5 favorite and starting 122-pound highweight Tape to Tape in the final strides to get up by a neck. W W Candy carried 118 pounds, ran 6 1/2 furlongs in 1:16.61, and paid $13.20. Went West, who got a perfect trip and had no excuse, finished third, 1 1/2 lengths behind Tape to Tape.

Hustled hard to the lead, Tape to Tape set official fractions of 22.80 seconds and 44.31, going his second quarter-mile in 21.51, which is plausible since there is nearly no run-up to the start of timing in 6 1/2-furlong races at Hawthorne. Meanwhile, W W Candy sat last down the backstretch before getting engaged around the far turn. At the quarter pole, splitting horses, he got seriously squeezed and bumped hard by Kavod to his inside and Midnight Escape to the outside, but that only seemed to embolden W W Candy, who came with a rush to tag a tiring Tape to Tape.

A 6-year-old gelding, W W Candy is trained by Max Quinonez for Michael Kostich’s In His Favor Stable, which claimed W W Candy for that $8,500 tag back in October 2021. An Illinois-bred by Twirling Candy out of Tinca’s Song, by Unbridled’s Song, W W Candy hasn’t raced for a claiming price lower than $40,000 the last two calendar years and on Thursday, making his 31st start, the gelding hit a high-water mark.

:: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.