By Alan Carasso
Tokyo Racecourse is the site of the third leg of this year's Japan Road to the Triple Crown, the $273,301 Listed Hyacinth S. going the one turn mile. A field of 14, including a pair of expensive American-bred sons of Into Mischief, look to capitalize on the fact that the winners of the first two legs of the four-race series–Continuar (Jpn) (Drefong) and Derma Sotogake (Jpn) (Mind Your Biscuits), have hit the road for a significantly more valuable test in next Saturday's G3 Saudi Derby in Riyadh.
Great Sand Sea (Into Mischief) is the least-experience of those signed on, having made just one previous appearance, but the $385,000 Keeneland September yearling turned $825,000 OBS April breezer made the most of it. The bay colt sat a three-wide, no-cover trip before fighting on gamely to score a narrow victory over Holonic Path (Jpn) (Just a Way {Jpn}) in a 1400-meter maiden over this surface Nov. 19 (see below, SC 8) and the latter franked the form of the race when graduating by nearly 10 lengths in his next start. Joao Moreira, who rides Shirl's Speight (Speightstown) in the G1 February S. two races later, takes the call.
The other Into Mischief colt is Meta Max, a $180,000 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga grad who fetched $1.1 million at OBS March and broke his maiden when trying the dirt for the first time over five furlongs Jan. 21.
Perriere (Jpn) (Henny Hughes) is the overnight favorite, having defeated next-out romper Yuttitham (Jpn) (Justify–Zipessa) on Sapporo debut in August and adding a Tokyo allowance before finishing third to to the aforementioned Derma Sotogake and Omatsuri Otoko (Jpn) (Vittorio d'Oro) in the Listed Zen-Nippon Nisai Yushun Dec. 14.
The Hyacinth offers Kentucky Derby points on a 30-12-6-3 scale for the top four finishers. The final race on the Japan Road to the Kentucky Derby is the Fukuryu S. (allowance) going nine furlongs at Nakayama Mar. 25.
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