Weekend GamePlan: Picks for Woodbine Mile, Canadian Stakes, Iroquois Stakes for September 14, 2019

Train your eyes on northern skies Saturday because that’s where most of the stars in North American racing this weekend will be coming out.

The Woodbine card featuring the Woodbine Mile provides the highest-class racing of the week, though Churchill, which was to launch a short September meeting on Friday, has four stakes, including a pair of 2-year-old dirt-route races that should proffer clues to the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and Juvenile Fillies.

At Belmont, the $200,000 Pebbles Stakes headlines a moderate 11-race Saturday program. East, making her first start on the western side of the Atlantic, caught the eye in that fairly short field, but that race didn’t quite make the Weekend GamePlan grade.

Woodbine Mile

It’s great to see Got Stormy emerge this summer as potentially truly elite, and she can solidify her position as a leading Breeders’ Cup Mile hope here in the Woodbine Mile. That said, I’ll stand against her at the prices.

There’s nothing to fault about either of Got Stormy’s last two starts at Saratoga, including an awesome win over males in the Grade 1 Fourstardave, but the fact is both did come at Saratoga and the filly has never run like that at another venue. Might she just have emerged as a new, improved horse this summer after showing hints during 2018 and early 2019? Sure, but she was 5-1 to back up that guess in the Fourstardave and is listed at 8-5 here. And might Got Stormy have come through her two-races-in-a-week run the same way she went into it? Entirely possible, but demanding schedules have a way of taking their toll at some point.

Moreover, Got Stormy got a great setup before storming home last time, as did Raging Bull, who ran second to her and is the morning-line second choice here. Lucullan is worth a shout at anything like his 8-1 morning line, while 6-1 Synchrony has three excuses and a course and distance win from his last four starts.

But I’ll bet Awesometank here at a presumably square price. Trainer William Haggas (more on him shortly) has become a steady participant in North American racing and really seems to have a feel for which horses suit the style here. Awesometank has several appealing characteristics in that vein: She likes firm ground, she runs turns well, and she has positional speed.

She broke like an American horse in the Beverly D. before chasing pacemaker Thais through a strong pace, and for a flicker before the eighth pole, it looked like she might have a chance at Sistercharlie. In the end, no shame losing to a future Hall of Famer, and the cutback to a mile here could really suit. Envision her sitting second or third and getting first run on the shorter prices while pulling a seven-pound weight break from the bigger runs – could be an awesome scenario.

Canadian StakesOkay

Sticking with Woodbine, how about also sticking with Haggas in the Canadian Stakes? Magnetic Charm will likely look light on accomplishment to many bettors, and it’s true, she doesn’t have the résumé of shorter prices here like Competitionofideas and Holy Helena. But because she’s a 3-year-old lacking group stakes success, Magnetic Charm gets in at just 110 pounds, 11 fewer than the favorites. Haggas has eased her along slowly this season after she showed group-level ability as a 2-year-old and her second of 27 in the prestigious Sandringham Stakes at Royal Ascot set the bar fairly high. Couple with that her solid performance at York, a racecourse not all that unlike Woodbine, and Magnetic Charm might pull one in looking like a live longshot.

Iroquois Stakes

Since Dennis’ Moment and his towering Beyer from his debut victory (won by a country mile) didn’t scare opponents away, perhaps he shouldn’t scare you away from betting against him in the Iroquois Stakes. Don’t get me wrong – Dennis’ Moment traveled like a good horse and as a son of Tiznow, among my favorite racehorses and stallions, he’s bred to stretch out. But this move to two turns comes in a race that drew a surplus of quick horses, and I’m not sure Dennis, fast as he might be, has the gas to get to the front (if his connections even want him there) without expending a lot of energy. It’s also worth noting that Dennis’ Moment is nearly certain to go off an odds-on favorite, not the 9-5 at which he’s listed.

Let’s see if Letmeno can get the right trip and, as seems likely, move forward at two turns. Trainer Ian Wilkes doesn’t win with a lot of first-timers but this one turned in a good debut run to score going away, then spent much of the Ellis Park Juvenile waiting for a place to run. He didn’t fly home but finished just as well as winner Rowdy Yates and has more upside on the day at a considerably longer price.