Weekend GamePlan: Picks for San Vicente, Ginger Brew, Ladies

Even with short fields, potential value beckons in featured New York and California races on the first Saturday of 2024. Meanwhile, in Florida, a live filly in her stakes debut should be a square price.

San Vicente

Muth is the 600-pound gorilla in the seven-furlong San Vicente. Is he quite as good as his speed figures, and is Muth invulnerable?

Muth, a $2 million purchase at a March 2-year-old auction, was able to go straight into racetrack training, posting his first Santa Anita workout on April 9. No wonder he was especially advanced making a five-furlong debut June 18, when he went to the lead and romped.

Favored at 1-2 about two months later in the Best Pal, Muth was stomped by Bob Baffert-trained stablemate Prince of Monaco, whose star since has dimmed. Muth easily won the Grade 1 American Pharoah, but this, like his debut, was a case of a talented, precocious colt beating modest rivals more than the rising of a star. Runner-up Wine Me Up was beaten nearly 40 lengths in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and finished a tame fourth in the Los Alamitos Futurity.

Muth managed a second-place Juvenile finish, but the wire saved him from being caught by Locked, and in final reckoning, Muth looks like a horse who hasn’t progressed substantially.

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The two outside-drawn San Vicente entrants are overmatched. Slider’s return to dirt might help, but he’s unlikely to make a clear lead and might need one to see out seven furlongs. Moonlit Sonata’s maiden race has come back soft, and his lone subsequent workout video available online, from Dec. 16, was borderline disastrous.

That leaves Baffert-trained Pilot Commander, more than merely a default selection.

You can’t say Pilot Commander didn’t change leads winning his lone start, but the lead change came literally in the final stride. Even so, and while racing like an immature colt, he won encouragingly over stablemate Imagination, who landed a Jan. 1 maiden mile with a 79 Beyer Speed Figure. Pilot Commander’s race came almost two months ago, and the colt, in workout videos, appears to have blossomed.

The poor lead change is an outlier: Pilot Commander switches professionally in his drills. His stride has gotten increasingly fluid and easy (he bounds along a lot like his sire, Justify).

After badly outworking Wynstock in a fast Dec. 4 gate work, Wynstock’s penultimate drill before capturing the Grade 2 Los Al Futurity, Pilot Commander was matched with none other than Muth on Dec. 26. Muth, working on the inside, required two pops of the crop just to stay even with Pilot Commander, whose rider barely was asking for anything, and the late surge that put Pilot Commander ahead at the wire suggested the supposedly lesser animal had more run all along.

Works aren’t everything, but the difference in win price between an exposed 3-year-old and a talented second-time starter makes Pilot Commander worth a play.

Ginger Brew

Waskesiu ran modestly in her debut. She was better, not great, second time out, but both races were dirt sprints, and Waskesiu obviously found her calling in a turf route Nov. 18 at Aqueduct.

Did Waskesiu get a perfect trip facing moderate opposition? She did. Did Waskesiu look like a filly who could stay nine furlongs, perhaps farther? Yes. But she also displayed a smooth turn of foot in upper stretch and was doing her best work at the finish – like a filly who had just realized what the activity of racing was all about.

She brims with upside in her second grass race and gets a vote of confidence from Bill Mott going straight to stakes competition. And the race’s most accomplished horse, Life’s an Audible, is marooned in post 12.

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Ladies

Just six horses here, but it’s possible the strong selection, Evidencias, could be fourth choice behind She’s Mo Bubbly, Comparative, and Saddle Up Jessie.

Those three horses exit career-best performances that the betting public will overrate. Evidencias, meanwhile, comes out of a second-place finish Dec. 1 behind loose leader Hot Fudge, who returned to win the Garland of Roses Stakes. That one-turn mile simply was too short for Evidencias, who might not have faced high-level competition, but traveled strongly throughout her Group 2, 1 1/4-mile dirt win in Brazil.

The mare is very likely to take a considerable step forward going nine furlongs in her third North American start, and I believe she’ll be undervalued in the Ladies.

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