ARCADIA, Calif. – Setsuko’s career as a gelding got off to a stellar start with a comprehensive win in an optional claimer Feb. 4 at Santa Anita, just his second victory in 17 starts.
Three weeks later, he continues to thrive, working seven furlongs in 1:23.80 at Santa Anita on Friday.
“He worked awesome,” trainer Richard Mandella said.
Now comes the hard part, trying to win his elusive first stakes in the $750,000 Santa Anita Handicap next Saturday.
Glinda the Good, who lined up against some top-class competition last year at 2, will launch her season Sunday in the $50,000 Island Fashion at Sunland Park in New Mexico. The one-mile race is for 3-year-old fillies, and it serves as a stepping-stone to the $200,000 Sunland Park Oaks on March 25.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Musketier must be a happy horse. If he wasn’t, trainer Roger Attfield wouldn’t have brought the veteran back to run again at the age of 10 for a campaign that will begin in Sunday’s $150,000 Mac Diarmida at Gulfstream Park.
Musketier will make his 45th career start in the Grade 2 Mac Diarmida. His 44th was one of his best yet, resulting in a half-length victory over stablemate Simmard in Calder’s Grade 2 W.L. McKnight in his 2011 finale. Simmard will also be among the 10 long-winded turf specialists signed on for the 1 3/8-mile Mac Diarmida.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Caleb’s Posse, the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile winner based at Oaklawn Park, is scheduled to fly out Tuesday for a start in the Grade 3, $200,000 Tom Fool at Aqueduct, said his trainer, Donnie Von Hemel. The race is Saturday, March 3.
Caleb’s Posse will fly out of Memphis, Tenn., into New York, said Von Hemel. It is about a three-hour van ride from Oaklawn to Memphis. The Tom Fool will be the first start since the Breeders’ Cup for Caleb’s Posse, who was a finalist for champion 3-year-old and champion sprinter of 2011.
NEW ORLEANS – Trainer Neil Pessin dashed out for lunch Friday to one of his favorite places around here, Charlie’s Sea Food in nearby Harahan. He recommends the seafood-stuffed eggplant and the corn and crab chowder, by the way.
Oceanik never had a steady schedule of races in a lucrative 2-year-old campaign last year.
Winless in seven starts at 2, he had a successful year, earning $137,390 for owner Harold Nichols, a sum boosted by a third-place finish in the Ed Burke Million Futurity last June.
A great Saturday of racing and wagering is followed by another banner day Sunday, Feb. 26, 2012, when Gulfstream Park stages the Grade 2 Fountain of Youth, a race that falls in the sequence of the track’s unique 10-cent minimum pick six. Below is a quick look at the six races, and I'm building my recommended wager with TicketMaker, found exclusively on DRF.com.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – In college basketball, midseason meetings between the number one- and number two-ranked teams are well-hyped, often meaningless, and usually long forgotten by the time the Big Dance rolls around. On the Kentucky Derby trail, confrontations between the number one and two prospects 10 weeks in advance of the main event are rare, highly anticipated, and a bit more relevant – but perhaps no real harbinger of what to expect on the first Saturday of May.
ARCADIA, Calif. – The favorites in the feature race Sunday at Santa Anita are opposites – Smoking G is a fast horse that runs near the front, Stoney Fleece is a deep closer that mows them down late.
Smoking G and Stoney Fleece meet Sunday in the $70,000 Baffle Stakes, a 6 1/2-furlong turf sprint for 3-year-olds that will be decided by an age-old handicapping riddle – speed or class? If the answer is speed, then Smoking G is the right horse.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Coming off impressive victories in mid-January, Great Gracie Dane and Opus A will vie for favoritism in Sunday’s $75,000 Hildy’s Grey overnight stakes for New York-bred fillies and mares at Aqueduct.
Sunday's card will feature a $113,726 pick-six carryover as the bet went unhit for the second consecutive day Saturday.
