- None
In our On Tap feature for the weekend, we posed several questions that the weekend’s racing would answer. Today’s LookBack provides the answers:
- Will Julio Cartagena finish out of the exacta at Laurel? He has three wins and three seconds at the track so far this meet from just six starters. He has two entered on Saturday.
- Yes. His Vigilante Law finished seventh in the second race at odds of 8.10-1.
- In that same vein, who will win Laurel’s second race? It’s a lowly $6,250 claimer — but the trainers of six of the eight horses are winning at a 20 percent or better clip (Cartagena, Jamie Ness, Howard Wolfendale, Juan Vazquez, Michael Pino, and David Jacobson).
- One of those 20 percent trainers — Jamie Ness — won the race with No Shenanigans, defeating another high percentage trainer (David Jacobson, trainer of Adirondack Express) by a neck.
- Will Dance to Bristol (here) get to the airport on time?
- Yes, and to California without incident.
- How will Bowie-based Phil Schoenthal’s two juveniles do up at Belmont on Sunday?
- Not as well as he might have hoped. Miss Behaviour, sent off as the 7-10 favorite in the Sharp Cat, finished second, beaten by less than a length while comfortably clear of the show horse. And Sonny Inspired finished a well-beaten fifth at odds of 12.40-1 in the Awad.
- What will happen to the region’s handle, particularly at Charles Town?
- One week after a big night for the West Virginia Breeders Classics, Charles Town saw its handle drop roughly in half. A week after logging more than $1.5 million in wagers, the track’s Saturday handle was less than $700,000, one of its more sluggish Saturdays. The picture was similar at Laurel a week after the Maryland Million; the top win-place-show pool for any race at Laurel was less than $63,000, less than all but a few races last week.
- Can Sixteen Stone get it back in gear at Parx in the eighth, a first level allowance?
- No. Sixteen Stone was never involved and finished eighth of nine. The chart merely says, “SIXTEEN STONE showed nothing.”
- Can The Royal Boot, with five wins on the season, add her sixth in Saturday’s fifth race from the Meadowlands?
- No. She dueled for the lead before tiring and fading to last, of seven, in the five furlong turf test.
- Some other big stories from the last week:
- And coming this week… we’ll take a look at the Breeders’ Cup, from a Midlantic perspective. Wise Dan, Princess of Sylmar, Dance to Bristol, and more!
(Featured image, of Eighttofasttocatch winning the Maryland Million Classic, by Laurie Asseo.)
