Wild Jewels has finished first or second in four of his five starts in California this year, with the exception a fifth-place finish in the Graduation Stakes at Del Mar in August.
That loss offers a clue as to how Wild Jewels may fare in his one-mile debut in Saturday’s $75,000 Gold Rush Stakes for 2-year-olds at Golden Gate Fields.
“In the stakes at Del Mar, he got packed way out in the middle of the track and closed some ground in the lane,” trainer Steve Specht recalled Thursday.
The trainer Robertino Diodoro might better be named Triodoro when it comes to the Claiming Crown Jewel.
Diodoro has not one, not two, but three of the nine entrants in the $200,000 Jewel, the last and most valuable of eight Claiming Crown races on an 11-race Saturday card at Fair Grounds.
Although the Jimmy Durante Stakes for juvenile fillies at Del Mar is designated as a Grade 3, the reality is the turf mile more closely resembles an entry-level allowance than a graded stakes.
Six of the nine editions of the Jimmy Durante were won by last-out maiden winners, a pattern that will be tested Saturday when the $100,000 stakes race is run for the 10th time. More than half the field is moving up in class from maiden races, including top contender Lady de Berry.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – The finales of the rich Florida Sire Series, the 1 1/16-mile In Reality and My Dear Girl Stakes, were pushed back nearly two months on the calendar this season to give potential candidates extra time to mature before facing the sternest test of their young careers.
But no matter the date, the key question Saturday is the same as always for the majority of the youngsters entered, including odds-on favorites Bentornato in the In Reality and R Harper Rose in the My Dear Girl, neither of whom have ever raced beyond seven furlongs.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Good Sam and Gerrymander give trainer Chad Brown a strong one-two punch in Saturday’s Grade 3, $200,000 Go for Wand Stakes at Aqueduct.
Good Sam, who won the Tempted Stakes last year in her second start, is coming off a solid second-level allowance win going seven furlongs here on Oct. 4. A daughter of Good Samaritan owned by Peter Brant, Good Sam is 3 for 3 at Aqueduct.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer Tony Dutrow was prepared to shut down Vino Rouge for the season after her runner-up finish to Shimmering Allure in the Tempted Stakes last month.
But the filly came out of the race so well and has trained so forwardly since that Dutrow opted to keep going with her and has entered Vino Rouge in Saturday’s Grade 2, $250,000 Demoiselle Stakes at Aqueduct.
Several fillies with an affinity for Turfway Park, led by three-time stakes winner Marissa’s Lady, and several with class on turf make up a full field for Saturday night’s $125,000 Holiday Inaugural Stakes, for fillies and mares going six furlongs on the Tapeta.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – With his Kentucky Derby-winning brother Mage now retired, Dornoch looks to begin his own path to next year’s Run for the Roses when he runs as the potential favorite in a highly competitive renewal of the Grade 2, $250,000 Remsen Stakes at Aqueduct.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Two heads away from being undefeated, Everso Mischievous looks to close out a solid 3-year-old campaign with his fourth straight victory when he heads a field of 12 entered in Saturday’s Grade 2, $500,000 Cigar Mile Handicap at Aqueduct.
The addition of blinkers and the natural maturity of a young horse has helped Everso Mischievous develop from a beaten odds-on favorite on debut here nine months ago into a multiple stakes winner who has won his last three starts, including the Grade 2 Forty Niner Stakes here Oct. 28.
One month after California horses got swept by out-of-state shippers in the Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita, a similar scenario is developing in California’s first Grade 1 since – the Hollywood Derby on Saturday at Del Mar.
The top three finishers in last month’s Grade 2 Twilight Derby at Santa Anita enter with proper credentials, but the Hollywood Derby is always tougher, especially when the deepest turf stable in the country comes calling.
