Next Stop: Saratoga

Six weeks of racing at Saratoga Springs starts this Friday after what felt like an eternity of a meet at Belmont following the Independence Day weekend blowout cards. Having a winning Saratoga meet is akin to winning a batting title in baseball or a major in golf; it is tough, it has been done before, and doing so deserves some kind of commemoration or plaque of some type. As it is every year, the juvenile races and stakes races are the feature attractions of the meet.

Juvenile Junction

The two-year-old maiden and stakes races are an integral part of the summer meet. Classy debut starters and Pletcher entries are seemingly in each event. One of Pletcher’s main charges for the meet is Overdriven, each call in his debut was faster than the last and he was 16 ½ lengths in front of the show runner Big Creek in his debut. J C’s Pride was second in that race and was in front of the Pletcher stable star for the first half mile of that race and his turn time was five lengths faster than the normal for the five furlong distance.

Over at Churchill there was a maiden race on July 2nd that was faster than average for the 4-½ furlong distance. She Digs Me and Next Right Thing battled down to the finish with She Digs Me getting the better of her inexperienced rival, they were eight lengths in front of the third place finisher. She Digs Me will likely start in one of the stakes races for the colts and Next Right Thing will likely start in a maiden race up at the Spa.

Born Bullish ran off the page in her first start, winning by nine lengths. The comments read,”…moved up willingly towards the front runners unasked for speed, drew along side MISS POSSE midway on the turn, bided her time before moving past that rival to take over under her own courage…”. The danger with betting a two-year-old filly coming off of a big win is the possible bounce that takes place from that last effort though.

The Futurity and Matron were moved from their traditional spots on the fall championship meet to early July, setting up these two races as preps for the according Saratoga stakes races. That being said, the Futurity winner Jack’s On Deck and Matron winner Millionreasonswhy may be in tougher in their next starts at Saratoga, their pace and speed figures were no better than average for the six furlong distance. Churchill juvenile stakes winners Exfactor (Bashford Manor, colts) and Flashy Lassie (Debutante, fillies) was no better on the same measures.

Tizway we go

On May 30 Tizway was the winner of the Met Mile with the scintillating final time of 1:32.9 for one mile. On further review, that race was too good to be true. The variant for that race was one; the average variant for the one turn mile at Belmont is a 21. In other words, the surface was extremely fast that day. Rodman did very little in his next start in the Suburban Handicap as the even money favorite. Tizway is supposed to make his next start in the Whitney, buyers beware.

Street Game wired the field in the Hill Prince back on June 18, defeating Virginia Derby winner Air Support by open lengths. Street Game ran an impressive closing fraction that was one of the better efforts put forth at a mile race on the outer turf course. The speed figure was eight lengths faster than average as well. Over that speed favoring turf course upstate, he could easily wire a field or two if left to his own devices.

The Dwyer Stakes will likely produce a few starters for the Jim Dandy and Haskell, the race was not all that fast though. It was six lengths slow at the half, ten lengths slow at the three-quarters mark, and eight lengths slow at the finish. The winner and runner-up will more than likely be overbet in their next start.