Weekend Warrior for May 9: Picks for Beaugay, Decathlon, American
Belmont Park has a stakes-heavy card Saturday, topped by the Grade 1, $400,000 Man o’ War. The Grade 2, $250,000 Ruffian, the Grade 2, $200,000 Peter Pan (the erstwhile local prep for the Belmont Stakes), and the Grade 3, $150,000 Beaugay are the undercard stakes.
Santa Anita would have had the biggest race of the day in the Grade 1, $300,000 Vanity. But a terrific match-up between two-time Eclipse Award winner Beholder and the red-hot Warren’s Veneda will have to wait because Beholder will be scratched due to a fever. The supporting feature at Santa Anita is the Grade 3, $100,000 American Stakes.
Beaugay Stakes
Discreet Marq was a late scratch from a stakes at Gulfstream two weeks ago due to heavy midafternoon rain and instead will make this her first start since her third in the Grade 1 Matriarch last November. Discreet Marq is good and consistent. But she’s also lost a few races she should have won, is coming back in a much tougher race than she was originally intended for, and does not have to win.
I was impressed with Radiator’s recent U.S. debut at Keeneland, and she is my preference. I know that Radiator had a dream trip in that Keeneland race, sitting nicely tucked in on the inside behind the leaders before having a nice, big, opportune gap open up between horses in upper stretch for her to charge through. I am also aware that it was only an entry-level allowance race and that Radiator is stepping way up Saturday.
However, Radiator could not have been more striking visually. She showed a beautiful burst of stretch speed to overwhelm her opposition and only really ran for about a sixteenth of a mile because that’s all she had to do. Yet she won pretty much eased up over a next-out winner in a reasonably good final time.
Radiator was cut out to be a top-class performer. She is out of Heat Haze, who was a multiple Grade 1 winner on turf in this country, and is from the immediate family of U.S. female turf champions Banks Hill and Intercontinental and the top sire Dansili. In this country, with Lasix, it would be a surprise if Radiator didn’t make short work of races like this.
I would have liked to have used the Peter Pan as one of my Warrior races this week, but I have a policy to avoid five-horse fields if at all possible. Even if you don’t like the favorite, you very likely won’t get much of a price on the one you do like.
Anyway, I like Wolf Man Rocket in the Peter Pan off his eye-catching maiden win most recently in the Northern Spur. Not only did Wolf Man Rocket rally into an easy early pace to score decisively, he did so after racing five wide on the first turn and four wide on the second turn.
Decathlon Stakes
There are many ways to go in this opening-day feature at Monmouth, but I like A.P. Indian, not only for how he ran while narrowly missing in a tough allowance race at Keeneland last time but also for what he’s doing here distance-wise.
In what was the best race of his career, A.P. Indian was nosed by the capable Transparent at Keeneland after being hounded by him all the way around the track. Now, A.P. Indian cuts back from a route to a sprint, which suits this horse and is a big move for his trainer, Arnaud Delacour.
American Stakes
Bal a Bali is quite a story. He won 11 of 12 starts in his native Brazil, including the Brazilian Triple Crown, overcame laminitis last summer, and is apparently training very well for his U.S. debut here. And I expect his amazing story will manifest itself in strong support at the windows. But from two videos I watched of him in Brazil, Bal a Bali doesn’t seem to have much speed, and that could be a problem in this spot.
I’m going with Winning Prize, an unlucky loser of the Thunder Road most recently in that he was nailed by the horse who came through the rail spot he vacated. The important considerations here are that the Thunder Road proved that Winning Prize has cycled back to top form, and he will be a forward factor in a race lacking much pace.