– Trainer Barry Abrams and apprentice Joe Talamo at Hollywood. The pair have won four of five in the past three weeks; their overall percentage is 36% for 2006-2007. Talamo is also doing well with horses from trainer Vladimir Cerin’s barn, winning three of eight in the last month and finishing second or third in four others, giving the pair an 88% ITM rate for June.
– Debut starters by first-crop sire Hook and Ladder, who got his third winner out of five runners to race so far on Thursday at Belmont. I Promise, out of the Affirmed mare Affirm Promise, paid $26.80 to win race two, a five furlong maiden special weight.
Posted by JC in Handicapping on 06/29/2007 @ 8:30 am / Follow @railbird on Twitter
The most intriguing horse running at Belmont on Saturday may well be Forest Jazzy in the seventh, a six furlong allowance N1X on the inner turf. The three-year-old filly galloped to a 24-length victory in her debut at River Downs six weeks ago, earning an 89 Beyer for the effort. (Check out the race on CalRacing and try not to feel sorry for the horse who ran second.) Starting for Bill Mott, the daughter of Forestry (sire of Discreet Cat and Diplomat Lady, the longest shot to ever win the G1 Hollywood Starlet) will try turf for the first time, the surface on which her dam, Pomona, scored a couple of allowance wins and finished second to female turf champion Fiji in the 1998 G2 Santa Barbara.
Results: It might be back to River Downs for Forest Jazzy after the filly set the pace in Saturday’s seventh then tired badly in the stretch as the 3-2 favorite, finishing last.
Posted by JC in Races/Results on 06/29/2007 @ 12:00 am / Follow @railbird on Twitter
T.D. Thornton, author of the excellent new book “Not by a Longshot,” said many good and interesting things about slots, racing, and great horses in today’s Blood-Horse chat, but this exchange just might be the highlight:
Peabody, MA: When I went to the MassCap when Cigar ran there was a MassCap monkey. He was not there when Offlee Wild won the race. Can you tell management to bring back the monkey?
Thornton: If you ever see one of these Blood-Horse chats and wonder if acquaintances of the guest ever try to sneak through an inside joke or two, this is your proof right here. This is a strange-but-true press box tale from the days of yore at Suffolk, when we actually did hire an organ-grinding monkey to roam through the crowd and entertain the fans on big racing days. We used to have a rather nice (but somewhat batty) old lady who constantly called the track to ask — of all things — when the monkey was going to be back for a repeat performance. It was a riot, because we had just delivered the best horse in the world (Cigar) to the Boston fans two years in a row, and here was this woman, very insistent and earnest, about how the “MassCap Monkey” was the star of the show. Gotta give the people what they want, I guess.
The MassCap will be run this year on September 22 after a two year hiatus. New track owner Richard Fields is offering substantial bonuses to attract a strong field; there’s been no mention of a monkey.
Posted by JC in Suffolk Downs on 06/28/2007 @ 9:30 pm / Follow @railbird on Twitter
