Muth and Imagination, potentially the top two betting favorites for the $2 million Preakness Stakes on May 18, put in their final workouts for the race Friday at Santa Anita going six furlongs in company in 1:11.80, according to the Santa Anita clockers.
Bob Baffert, the trainer of both horses, said the two were basically together from the time the work began at the five-furlong pole. The two horses also worked together last Saturday, covering the same distance in 1:11.40.
The 4-year-old filly Occult never has raced against older horses and hasn’t raced at all since Oct. 28, but seems destined for odds-on favoritism Sunday at Monmouth Park in the $100,000 Serena’s Song Stakes.
That’s probably merited. Occult lacks Grade 1 credentials but has the makings of a solid Grade 2-type horse in the older filly and mare middle-distance dirt division. She faces seven foes in the Serena’s Song, a one mile and 70-yard contest, and to be honest, her rivals are a ragtag bunch.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Only four starters in a weekend stakes race at Santa Anita is not as bad as it looks. It is worse.
High-figure maiden winner Ball Don’t Lie and stakes-placed Tapalo run Sunday in the $100,000 Lazaro Barrera Stakes, a sprint for 3-year-olds that is barely hanging on. The 2023 race had four runners; the 2022 edition was canceled due to insufficient entries; the 2021 Barrera had four runners.
For a 2-year-old with one start, My Budd is “pretty high spirited,” according to trainer Heath Taylor.
Maybe a bit too much so.
“He’s not a kid’s horse,” Taylor told Los Alamitos publicity last month. “He’s a handful.”
My Budd is also brilliantly fast, and may go favored in Sunday’s $256,200 Robert Adair Kindergarten Futurity for 2-year-olds. The Kindergarten, run at 300 yards, is the season’s first futurity at Los Alamitos.
A deserved first Grade 1 now behind her, the 4-year-old filly Vahva has two more of them as long-term goals for 2024.
Winner of the Grade 3 Charles Town Oaks and the Grade 2 Raven Run to cap her 2023 campaign, Vahva made her first start of this year in the Grade 1 Madison at Keeneland, where she closed steadily but fell short of catching victorious Alva Starr. On May 4 in the seven-furlong, Grade 1 Derby City Distaff at Churchill Downs, Alva Starr couldn’t come close to containing Vahva, who cruised to a two-length victory that yielded a career-best 103 Beyer Speed Figure.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – There are several racing fit Florida shippers in Sunday’s headliner, including Read On and Fighter in the Win, who are both making their Woodbine bow in the first-level allowance route with a $32,000 claiming option.
Prisoner is the horse to beat at Emerald Downs in Sunday’s featured eighth race for $25,000 claimers over 5 1/2 furlongs. The 6-year-old son of Violence recently raised his career record to 10 wins from 20 lifetime starts with a victory over allowance company going 6 1/2 furlongs at Turf Paradise.
A Justin Evans trainee, Prisoner drew the outside post in the field of eight and boasts the highest last-out Beyer Speed Figure of the group at 78.
One week after the Derby, a Belmont Stakes prep in New York that will lose it’s morning-line favorite to the Preakness. First leg of the Triple Crown in the books. Triple Crown season still in full swing.
Peter Pan
Tuscan Gold, who probably would have won, will be scratched from this in favor of the Preakness (which he also might win). Lonesome Boy also is coming out (more on him shortly), still leaving a pretty tasty field of six pending further scratches.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer Chad Brown’s recent dominance of the Beaugay Stakes should continue Saturday at Aqueduct when he sends out Whitebeam and Aspray in the Grade 3, $175,000 turf stakes for fillies and mares at 1 1/16 miles.
The Beaugay was originally scheduled for last weekend, but failed to draw enough entries to be carded. As it is, only five were entered this time, including Quarrel who was entered in a Friday allowance race. The Beaugay is scheduled as race 2 on an 11-race card that begins at 12:35 p.m.
Nice as Pie rides a four-race win streak, the last two of those in stakes competition, into the $225,000 Mamzelle on Saturday at Churchill Downs. Her running style, waiting well behind the leaders and coming with one big run, theoretically suits a full field with several pace players. Yet one yawning question arises: Will Nice as Pie be as nice going 5 1/2 furlongs on turf as she’s been sprinting over a synthetic surface?
