Racing News and Notes
September 6th, 2011By ROBERT KIECKHEFER
UPI Racing Writer
Hall of Fame trainer Jerry Hollendorfer wins his 6000th race!Havre de Grace is starting to look like a potential successor to the last two Horse of the Year honorees – Rachel Alexandra and Zenyatta.
Like those two champion fillies, Havre de Grace now has made her mark by defeating males on the square. And she did it Saturday in the same race Rachel Alexandra won two years ago – the Woodward Stakes at Saratoga.
Since finishing third in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Ladies’ Classic, Havre de Grace had run roughshod over competitors of her own gender, losing only once in four previous starts this year – that to her frequent rival, Blind Luck, by a nose in the Delaware Handicap.
But she had never tackled males – especially a field like the Woodward, stuffed full of graded stakes winners.
Havre de Grace held a strategic position down the backstretch as Rule made the early lead with Mission Impazible between them. When jockey Ramon Dominguez let out a notch on his hold, Havre de Grace responded quickly, moving into contention around the turn and into the stretch.
She caught Rule with less than a furlong to run and gradually drew clear, eventually winning by 1 1/4 lengths over fast-finishing Flat Out. Rule held third, followed by Mission Impazible, Giant Oak, Ice Box, Mambo Meister and Convocation.
Havre de Grace, a 4-year-old, Kentucky-bred Saint Liam filly, finished the 9 furlongs on a fast track in 1:49.18.
Asked about potential Horse of the Year honors, winning trainer Larry Jones said, “I definitely think we’re in the picture. I think we were in the picture before, maybe a low-profile picture. But I think this puts us up there with everyone else. We have to continue on. It’s not over today, by any means.
“We said to ourselves, we were going to put her in a position to earn a championship if she was good enough. By coming here today we gave her the opportunity to move closer to a championship. I think she did it. I think we’re in front of the division.”
Winning the year’s top honor, however, could require more and Havre de Grace’s connections know that. Jones said her next race will be against other distaffers because “we don’t want to knock her out before the Breeders’ Cup.”
And would that be the Breeders’ Cup Classic, Larry, or the Ladies’ Classic?
“Who knows?” he replied. “Believe me, we’re considering both.”
Trainer Jerry Hollendorfer won his 6,000th race Saturday when he sent out Just Tappin It to victory in the sixth race at Golden Gate Fields, according to statistics compiled by Equibase.
Rapid Redux won his 16th straight race in Sunday’s feature at the Maryland State Fair, joining Citation and Cigar among Thoroughbreds achieving 16 wins in a row. Accomplished primarily against starter allowance company, the streak moves its focus to Zenyatta and Pepper’s Pride, who share the North American record at 19 straight victories – Pepper’s Pride in New Mexico; Zenyatta against some of the world’s top horses.
If you blinked, you missed it but Ochoa, the favorite, won Monday’s $2.4 million Futurity at Ruidoso Downs by a whopping 1 1/2 lengths over Jess Send Me. Tee Cos finished third in the 440-yard dash over a fast track. Ochoa was clocked in 21.058 seconds with Roy Baldillez along for the ride. Ochoa is a Texas-bred gelding by Tres Seis out of the Stoli mare Stolis Fortune.
Del Mar will pay horsemen a record underpayment of more than $1 million after the conclusion of its 37-day race meeting Wednesday. That amounts to at least 8 percent added to the overnight purses paid during the seven-week meeting and track officials attribute the boost to purses in excess of $600,000 a day, which resulted in slightly bigger fields and “solid wagering numbers.” “This has been a delightful surprise for myself and others,” said Del Mar Vice President and Racing Secretary Tom Robbins.
