The Week in Review: Versatile Duo Leaning Toward Classic

It's the pretty rare horse that can win a Grade I race on both the turf and dirt in the same year, and if you do so you're joining company that includes the likes of Secretariat. Dr. Fager won the United Nations on the grass the same year he won the Whitney, but that was before the graded stakes system was put into place. In 2001, the mare Affluent won the GI La Brea S. on the dirt and GI Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup on the turf.

But, prior to this year, have two horses ever pulled off the second half of the turf-dirt Grade I double at the same meet? The answer has to be no, but that's exactly what Catholic Boy (More Than Ready) and Yoshida (Jpn) (Heart's Cry {Jpn}) have done during Saratoga 2018. Their ability to win on both surfaces gives them many options for the Breeders' Cup, but trainer Bill Mott (Yoshida) and Jonathan Thomas (Catholic Boy) said Sunday they are both inclined to point their horses to the GI Breeders' Cup Classic, and both also said they doubt they will have a prep race between now and then. Earlier in the week, Thomas had been saying he was likely to go back to the grass for the GII Hill Prince S. Oct. 6 at Belmont, but that doesn't appear to be his plan any more.

Saturday's Woodward was as wide-open a Grade I race as you will see, and Yoshida was the only horse among the 14 starters who had won a Grade I this year. The problem was that it came on the grass in the GI Turf Classic at Churchill Downs and he had never once run on the dirt.

“We discussed running him on the dirt before he had his first race,” Mott said. “He came over from Japan and his sire is a good turf sire over there, although he's by Sunday Silence. So there was reason to believe he would run on the grass. We worked him on the grass and we'd work him on the dirt, and he worked well on both surfaces. We went for the turf first and he ran well enough that we had to stay there for a while.

“You can just never rule anything out until you try it. You see a few horses that don't train well at all on dirt and you just go to turf. They give you no reason to try dirt. Then you get a horse like him and he trains well on both surfaces. But the proof is when you take them out there and do it in the afternoon. That's the only way to sort it out.”

As for the Classic, Mott said “it's certainly under consideration.”

Catholic Boy couldn't seem to figure out what kind of horse he was. He was a stakes winner on the grass at two and then won the GII Remsen S. on the dirt, which gave his owners and trainer Jonathan Thomas the green light to go for the GI Kentucky Derby. But he stubbed his toe, running a poor fourth in the GI Florida Derby and didn't get going again until he was put back on the grass, where he won the GIII Pennine Ridge S. at Belmont in June. He followed that up with a win in the GI Belmont Derby on the turf July 7. Just when it looked like he had proven once and for all that grass was where he belonged, Thomas changed course and entered him in the GI Runhappy Travers S., which he won by four lengths.

“We're seriously contemplating just training him up to the Breeders' Cup Classic,” Thomas said. That's more because of the timing. It's kind of a funny time. With 70 days, I'm not so sure he needs a prep from a fitness standpoint and he certainly doesn't from a seasoning standpoint.”

Thomas added that one of the primary reasons he's looking at the Classic as opposed to the GI Breeders' Cup Turf is because of its distance, ten furlongs.

“We've learned that he's a true mile-and-a-quarter horse,” he said. “That seems to be the distance he is most adept at. On his day, he's very good at a mile-and-an-eighth and the mile-and- a-half, we don't know. The real deal maker is the distance.”

Thomas has come to believe that Catholic Boy is better on the dirt.

“It's hard to pick it apart when he won Grade Is on both surfaces, but from a visual standpoint I thought his most impressive race was Travers on the dirt. If you're a numbers guy he ran a 4 1/4 on the Ragozin sheets in the Travers, which is the fastest 3-year-old route dirt race all year. Those numbers make him faster than any of the Triple Crown races. If you go by the numbers and the eye you can make the case he's better on dirt”

Kent Up To His Old Tricks

Kent Desormeaux, who has a reputation for not always riding his horses out to the finish line, was widely criticized for his ride on Aug. 25 in the fourth at Del Mar aboard Take a Leap (The Factor). The horse appeared to have second-place sewn up but Desormeaux wasn't exactly riding as if his life depended on it and he was caught at the wire and lost the place by a nose.

This time it was more than the bettors who were screaming foul. On Monday, the Del Mar stewards announced that they have turned the matter over to California Horse Racing Board investigators.

If past history is your guide, Desormeaux will get a slap on the wrist. And that's the real problem here. There have been dozens of incidents over the years where he has been accused of failing to ride his horse out, yet never once has he received a serious penalty for his actions. Where's the deterrent?

Had Take a Leap finished second instead of third his owners would have earned an extra $4,800. And who knows how much he may have cost bettors who used the horse in second in exactas, tirfectas and superfectas or bet him to place.

Sure, Desormeaux deserves blame here, but so do the stewards. They continually look the other way when he does this. Ironically, he was fined $250 for his ride, but not for what happened at the finish. They fined him for hitting the horse more than three times earlier in the race without giving the horse a chance to respond.

Give him 60 days for not persevering with Take a Leap incident and I guarantee you that will be the last time he will ever not ride out a horse.

Kentucky Downs Off To a Flying Start

Kentucky Downs handled $6.2 million Saturday, a record for an opening day at the Franklin, Kentucky track and the second highest handle in the track's history. Yet, the best may be yet to come.

Even though the track is already giving away an astronomical average of $2 million in purses a day over its five-day meet, track president Corey Johnsen said he believed the purses will continue to grow.

The majority of the money for purses at Kentucky Downs comes from the historical racing machines at the track. They currently have 753 and have been given permission to have as many as 1,200.

“There's more potential in this market with this product,” Johnsen said of the historical racing machines. “There is great potential. We're already up 25% this year over last year.”

Johnsen said that his goal is to continue to raise purses every year, somewhere along the lines of 10-20%. That could mean average purses of $300,000 a race within five years and $30 million given out during he meet.

Just to show how popular Kentucky Downs racing is with horsemen because of its purses, 53 names were dropped into the entry box for the sixth race, a $130,000 maiden event for juvenile fillies. Kentucky Downs limits its fields to 12 horses.

Lazarus Settles for Second

Taylor Made's fascinating experiment with the Standardbred pacer Lazarus hit a minor bump in the road when the New Zealand import was second Saturday night in the $600,000 Canadian Pacing Derby at Mohawk. He lost by 2 1/4 lengths.

But fear not. Taylor Made bought the horse primarily to stand at stud and he proved his credentials in this hemisphere when he won the Dan Patch at Hoosier Park. Besides, the winner, McWicked, is a seasoned pacer who is as good as anyone in his division.