LOUISVILLE – After a quiet start to the day, the nation’s reigning training king, Todd Pletcher, burst into the winner’s circle with a big bang when his big winning grass star English Channel waltzed in with the $400,000 Grade 1 Woodford Reserve Turf Classic.
The second choice at 7-2, English Channel got the “perfect trip” under Garrett Gomez in the 9furlong event, sitting just outside longshot pacemaker Cool Conductor.
The Conductor, off at 39-1, was a stubborn leader, roaring into the stretch and defying all comers.
Gomez went to the whip and had to work hard to get English Channel in full stride, but when the leader weakened, he inherited the lead and held off all challengers, including the 2-1 favorite Cacique, who held second ahead of Milk It Mick.
It was English Channel’s seventh win in 11 starts, taking his earnings to about $1.5 million. He ran the trip in 1:47.1, less than a second off Lure’s track record.
The Woodford was a nice addition to the two graded stakes Pletcher won Friday. “We got the perfect trip,” he said. “We’ll point him for the Manhattan at Belmont next month.”
CHURCHILL DOWNS HANDICAP
Talk about a West Coast heist!
While the Kentucky hardboots were looking the other way, two northern Californian horse racing legends – trainer Jerry Hollendorfer and jockey Russell Baze – snuck into town and hijacked the $200,000 Churchill Downs Handicap, a Grade 2 bonanza over 7 furlongs, with their aptly named Trickey Trevor.
Sent off at an astonishing 9-1 (he would have been 1-9 at Bay Meadows outside San Francisco), Trickey Trevor broke alertly, sat comfortably behind a couple of dueling leaders, then swooped at the top of the stretch to win going away by three lengths.
Battle Won, the 5-2 favorite, helped set the pace but faded when the real running began.
Trickey Trevor ran the trip in a nifty 1:21.68 and paid $21.
The astonishing aspect of the result was that it was Baze’s first winner ever at Churchill Downs.
He is the second-winningest jockey in American history with 9,312 wins, but had never scored at Churchill Downs until yesterday.
“It sure feels good,” he said. “I’d like to get one more today [in the Kentucky Derby].”
LA TORIENNE STAKES
You didn’t need to study the past performances to pick Joint Effort, the 3 1/4-length winner of yesterday’s Grade 3, $100,000 La Troienne Stakes for 3-year-old fillies. Just look to see who trained her – Dale Romans, the perennial leading conditioner at Churchill Downs – and head to the window and cash a fat $15.80 payoff.
Ridden by Edgar Prado in the 71/2-furlong race, Joint Effort sat just off the early pace set by Morner and Lake Alice dueling down the backside, gunned up the rail heading into the turn, then opened up to win as she pleased.
“I took the chance and sent her, and she took off like a rocket,” Prado said of Joint Effort, who finished off the board her last two starts but won the Sunshine Millions Oaks three back at Gulfstream Park.
Adieu, one of last year’s top 2-year-old fillies, making her first start for Todd Pletcher since the Breeders’ Cup last October, rallied for second as the 8-5 favorite.
HUMANA DISTAFF
Pussycat Doll, the longer half at 4-1 of the uncoupled Bob Baffert entry that included 4-5 favorite Behaving Badly, split horses with a late run down the stretch to beat her stablemate by a length in yesterday’s Grade 1, $250,000 Humana Distaff Handicap for fillies and mares.
The 4-year-old paid $10 after running the seven furlongs in a sharp 1:21.3.
Behaving Badly went right to the lead under Victor Espinoza, setting the pace down the backside pressed by Bending Strings.
Around the turn, Bending Strings went up with an aggressive move to draw on near-even terms with Behaving Badly, but the favorite spurted away down the stretch, only to have Pussycat Doll, making her first start since February, run by her in the last sixteenth of a mile.
Pussycat Doll, a homebred daughter of Real Quiet, is owned by Mike Pegram, who also campaigned her sire when he won the 1998 Derby for Baffert.
DISTAFF TURF MILE
It wouldn’t be a grass stake on a big racing day without Bobby Frankel saddling a filly from the international racing juggernaut Juddmonte Farm – and winning.
He did it again yesterday with the French import Mirabilis, having her fourth start in the U.S.
since shipping in from Longchamp, the Grade 3 Distaff Turf Mile worth $100,000. The big difference here was the price; the Derby crowd let her get away at 5-1.
It was a cakewalk.
Jockey Patrick Valenzuela parked Mirabilis at the flank of pacesetter Sis City, then pushed the button at the top of the stretch and, in a wink, the race was history. She won in a romp from 18-1 longshot Special Grayce, getting the mile in 1:35.9.
The big disappointment was the even-money favorite Wend, the local Claiborne Farm mare, looking for her third straight win. She had the run of the race, in fourth along the hedge under Edgar Prado, but came up empty in the stretch to finish off the board in fourth.
“I had the trip, Prado said, “but when I tried to go with her, she just didn’t have her fire today.”
