Weekend GamePlan: Picks for City of Hope Mile, John Henry Turf Championship, Pilgrim

Since Weekend GamePlan returns after sojourning overseas, it’s only fitting these races, coast to coast, will be contested on turf.

City of Hope Mile

We start with the City of Hope Mile because Trikari rates as one of the more interesting horses racing this weekend. He has star potential.

Allow me to recount a telephone conversation that took place, on my end, while standing along the Indiana-side bank of the Ohio River on April 30, when a trainer returned a call seeking comment on two stakes horses starting at Churchill Downs later that week. Those fillies duly discussed, the trainer said, “Aren’t you going to ask about the colt?” I wasn’t. His race hadn’t been assigned to me.

When a horseman casually brings up an entrant without prompting, take heed.

The trainer on the phone was Graham Motion, the colt was Trikari, and on May 4 he won the American Turf at 47-1.

That price, with the wisdom of hindsight, is crazy. Maybe the suggestion that Trikari has star potential will end up being described so, too. The City of Hope should provide key evidence.

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How did Trikari lose the Penn Mile? Difficult to say. Maybe he pulled a little too hard without cover, but I’m chalking up that performance to growth and development.

Yes, his win in the Belmont Derby came narrowly, but at 1 3/16 miles, that race’s distance falls outside the sweet spot for a colt who, at heart, looks like a miler. It did mark another step forward, though the real breakthrough came in the Secretariat.

While Trikari sat a favorable trip there, acceleration at the three-sixteenths pole revealed a turn of foot we hadn’t yet seen. Motion toyed with sending Trikari to the Grade 1 Coolmore Turf Mile at Keeneland in October – he clearly likes this horse. Easy to understand. He’s a stunner on looks, finishes with that leaping long stride. He might be special, even if the figures don’t yet say it, and the price here should be right to find out.

John Henry Turf Championship

Divin Propos brings three appealing characteristics to the John Henry Turf Championship: He’s a new face on the SoCal long-distance turf scene, he has a measure of pace in a race with an early-speed void, and he will offer fair odds. Sign me up.

You say that Cabo Spirit goes to the front here? Keep in mind that Cabo Spirit hasn’t led at the first call since November 2021. He’s also a horse unproven at a distance this long, and the idea of turning the race into a test of stamina makes no sense. And if Cabo Spirit leads, fine, Divin Propos sits just off him.

A French import, yes, but a horse with experience racing on the lead, as Divin Propos did hitting a career peak in August 2023. To be fair, that peak, as well as the next one in his final start before being purchased and sent to America, wasn’t especially high. Divin Propos campaigned in the provinces, never at a major racecourse, though the winner of his final French race returned to land a Group 2 in April.

Divin Propos comfortably won first- and second-level allowance races this summer, and his lone American defeat came with a very poor trip. While he has the appearance of an improving 4-year-old, the regulars in this division enter as known quantities. Gold Phoenix probably ranks as the best of them, but even with a dream trip, he barely won the Del Mar Handicap last out. Balnikhov probably was best in that race, but I doubt he comes right back to that level.

Phil D’Amato trains those two horses. He also trains Divin Propos, who, at a meaningfully longer price, gets the jump on both.

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Pilgrim

Some small samples carry more meaning than others. For instance, Todd Pletcher the last five years has sent out six 2-year-old starters switching from dirt into a turf stakes race. Their record: 3-1-0. Pletcher knows a 2-year-old grass horse when he sees one, and here he runs Noble Confessor, a maiden after two Saratoga dirt starts.

In 2023, Major Dude began his career with three dirt races, switched to turf and won the Pilgrim. In 2020, Mutasaabeq ran twice on Saratoga dirt, then landed the Bourbon on Keeneland turf.

Zulu Kingdom, favored here, won the With Anticipation in great part because he got through on the rail making his stretch run. Coming back on him in the final 50 yards was Tenacious Leader, trained by Pletcher, working regularly, presumably aimed at the Bourbon.

Pletcher has another horse – Noble Confessor – he thinks might win in New York.

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