Weekend GamePlan: Picks for Madison, Wood Memorial, Shakertown

Fresh off boldly forecasting a Hades defeat of Fierceness, things can hardly get worse with this Weekend GamePlan. Sure, process, not results, but rewatching Fierceness’s pre-Florida Derby breezes, he looks as invincible as he proved. Can anyone in New York, Kentucky, or California unseat him as the Derby favorite? Nope.

Madison

The Madison morning line goes 2-1 Vahva, 5-2 Alva Starr, 7-2 Red Carpet Ready, but this likely gets played as a two-horse race, Red Carpet Ready a more distant third choice. Alva Starr did come strongly to hand last summer, but a super sharp horse with great speed can really run up the margin of victory facing inferior competition. That happened in the Dashing Beauty (Cheetara basically is allowance-class) and the Prioress (Jersey Pearl has one outlier figure suggesting more than a listed-stakes filly). Vahva ran down Alva Starr last fall at Keeneland in the seven-furlong Raven Run because Alva Starr at heart wants six furlongs. The triple-digit Beyer both horses earned overstates their baselines.

Vahva developed markedly through 2023, and seven furlongs is her trip, but nothing in her form validates the big October fig, and it now has been the better part of six months since she’s raced. There was little behind the Raven Run top two, Dazzling Blue having long since stagnated.

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Alva Starr, who won an un-losable Oaklawn stakes two months ago, should make the lead. Red Carpet Ready has speed to go with her but was taken back from an inside draw winning Hurricane Bertie. She appeared to be running on fumes late in that 6 1/2-furlong contest; hard to imagine connections looking for a pace battle going seven-eighths.

The cutback suits Hot and Sultry, but one wonders what she can produce at this stage.

Big Pond isn’t a default selection. She’s a fast, progressive 4-year-old who will be overlooked, even if 20-1 on the line misses the mark. She is 5-3-2-0 on dirt, has the pace to get a clean outside pressing trip, and seven furlongs is her game. Her Nov. 25 comeback was modest, but Big Pond had yet to reach the peak form she’s since attained. A Grade 1 in name only, the La Brea nonetheless was Big Pond’s in one more jump. The Spring Fever showed she’s the boss of La Brea heroine Daddysruby, subsequently a solid second in the $250,000 Matron at Oaklawn.

The Spring Fever isn’t her only Cal-bred race that will be undervalued. Go back to the Fleet Treat last July. Second behind Big Pond was Chismosa, second Feb. 3 in the Grade 2 Santa Monica with an 89 Beyer, and in third came Ceiling Crusher, who came back to land the Grade 3 Torrey Pines before capturing the Grade 1 Cotillion.

The Spring Fever, short of Big Pond’s best trip, looked seriously impressive. The filly moved like a smoother, more confident horse. The same thing comes clear in a recent workout video.

Wood Memorial

I’m sandwiching a favorite between two prices because Deterministic, with a dozen others diffusing win money, could offer value in the Wood.

The fact a prudent, patient barn sent this colt into the Gotham to make his second career start following a long layoff indeed meant something. Deterministic, to these eyes, did everything right in the Gotham, comfortably beating solid rivals, doing so easily enough that he can take a step forward Saturday, especially at two turns.

Tuscan Sky should be a solid second choice. Two for two, he won his sprint debut looking like a route horse, then earned a high Beyer in his Fair Grounds route allowance win over distance-challenged Nash.

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Of potential note is how Tuscan Sky – as with Wynstock in the Santa Anita Derby – has been used in morning workouts: namely, as cannon fodder for higher-level 3-year-olds. Workouts aren’t everything, but they’re something, and Deterministic seems the more serious prospect.

Shakertown

Front Run the Fed will be seriously overlooked, in great part because he has so many races obscuring what he really wants to do: make one run in 5 1/2-furlong turf sprints. He ran the same race in the Joe Hernandez in late December at Santa Anita as he did in the 2022 Hernandez, which, like this year, was followed by a break and comeback turf sprint at Keeneland. Front Run the Fed’s eye-catching run last April came in a high-end allowance race of quality comparable to the Shakertown’s. Here’s hoping Reylu Gutierrez finds another way through.

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