Where the stretch rolls on forever

CYPRESS, Calif. – The 1,380-foot stretch at Los Alamitos is the longest in the nation, and can sometimes be a test for more than the horses.

Turning for home, horses have a few strides before they reach the quarter pole, leaving jockeys to judge the appropriate time to ask for maximum run. Opinions differ on the best way to ride the track.

“You have to stay in striking distance,” said jockey Drayden Van Dyke. “It’s hard to make up ground with the long stretch.”

At 20, Van Dyke is an expert on riding Los Alamitos. He won riding titles at the July and September meetings there last year en route to securing the Eclipse Award as the nation’s outstanding apprentice of 2014.

Van Dyke will be back at Los Alamitos when the track’s eight-day summer meeting begins Thursday, with three mounts on the eight-race program. The knowledge he and other riders gained in 2014 will be used at Los Alamitos meetings this month, in September and in December.

Los Alamitos was reconfigured to accommodate daytime Thoroughbred racing in the winter of 2013-14, following the closure of Hollywood Park. The existing five-eighth-mile track was expanded to a mile, with a tight first turn and a wider final turn. The tight first turn contributes to the long stretch, which is nearly 400 feet longer than the stretch at Santa Anita.

Tyler Baze, who finished second in the standings to Rafael Bejarano at the Los Alamitos meet last December, said the lengthy stretch must be respected with both speed horses and closers.

“You think you don’t have time [to make up ground] and you do,” Baze said. “I thought the speed would hold. It wasn’t like that at all. It’s fair.”

Baze said a speed-oriented horse needs to be nursed in early stretch.

“You try to wait as long as you can,” he said. “You don’t want to run out of horse.”

The longer stretch not only creates challenges for horses and riders, but is a twist for fans. Judging margins between horses in early stretch can be difficult.

Saving a horse’s energy for the stretch run is vital for a rider, said jockey Edwin Maldonado.

“You don’t want to get caught up in a speed duel,” said Maldonado. “It’s more tactical. You have to wait. You can always get caught if you move too soon.”

Maldonado, 32, is regarded as an accomplished gate jockey who excels with speed horses. He said that puts added pressure on him at Los Alamitos.

“They always give me speed horses,” he said. “You try to walk the dog and it’s hard. You can be running down the stretch and in front by three and think you have it won. It changes.”

There is always a closer lurking. Last July, Van Dyke recalls winning a maiden special weight at 5 1/2 furlongs on Sharla Rae, who has since won three stakes. Sharla Rae closed from sixth in a field of seven to win by more than a length.

“I’d won the title and it was icing on the cake,” he said. “I came from way off of it.”