Laurel Park: Spot plays and horses to watch, November 24
Edgar Prado smiles after Always Thinking won the Sensible Lady Turf Dash. Photo by Dottie Miller.
Gary Quill is taking a brief hiatus from his GQ Approach full-card picks and analysis. In his stead, we present daily spot plays and horses to watch. Good luck!
First post today 12:30 p.m. The late Pick 5 has no carryover. The Super Hi 5 has a carryover of $2,464.36. The Jackpot Rainbow Pick 6 has a carryover of $5,171.78. Ten races are on the card; races three and six have been taken off the dirt and put on the dirt, leaving four races scheduled for the turf.
ALL RACES HAVE BEEN TAKEN OFF THE TURF AS OF FRIDAY MORNING. SELECTIONS TO THE RIGHT AND ANALYSIS BELOW WERE MADE ASSUMING SIX DIRT AND FOUR TURF RACES.
- The question in race one, a conditioned starter allowance on the turf, is, Who’s going to drop $25k to get their hands on #1 Talkless Smilemore (8-5)? The Uncle Mo filly has a sizable class advantage over her rivals in this event and probably will get the money. She’s lost her last seven starts, all against allowance or stakes foes, and in some she was quite competitive. Dropping her into easier company is certainly the right move, but to do it, trainer Kelly Rubley is forced to expose her to being claimed. That’s a risk; she ought to win here and isn’t far from being good enough to win a couple of allowance races next year. And if not? The market certainly does like Uncle Mo offspring, including as broodmares.
TODAY’S FULL-CARD SELECTIONS
- Race 1 -10-8-3-4
- Race 2 -2-6-4-3
- Race 3 – 3-10-12-8
- Race4 – 4-1-7-6
- Race 5 – 3-4-7-8
- Race 6 – 13-12-4-7
- Race 7 – 8-9-5-1
- Race 8 – 5-2-1-8
- Race 9 – 6-3-12-10
- Race 10 – 7-9-8-4
- Worthy of Love (9-2) almost missed both her two-year-old and three-year-old seasons, making her career debut November 3 of her sophomore season. She ran a decent race that day, finishing fourth while beaten three lengths and change. In today’s fifth, a maiden special weight on the turf, she stretches out to a flat mile, a distance that might suit her very well indeed. Her dam, Who Did It and Run, by Polish Numbers, was a multiple graded stakes winner, and Worthy of Love is a half-sis to multiple stakes winner Giant Run. Trainer Graham Motion will leg up rider Feargal Lynch; that duo has a positive ROI together and a 24 percent strike rate.
- The eighth race is a third-level allowance sprint on the turf, and it’s brought together something of an odd group of horses: a couple that have been milers that may be changing their minds, a runner skipping a condition, etc. The favorite here is #2 English Minister (2-1), who’s a hard-hitting sort who won going six furlongs on the turf at Belmont two back. If he’s decided he’s a grass sprinter — and evidence is he may have — he’s a good bet in here. But he doesn’t win much — just four times in 39 starts — and his two recent good efforts sprinting both were at six furlongs. We’ll see how this 5 1/2 furlong distance suits. A runner in here who, on the other hand, specializes in this distance is #5 Uncle Youdge (6-1). Toss the last — around two turns when he really didn’t run a step — and this guy fits just fine in here. The Hugh McMahon trainee owns three wins at the distance, beat allowance foes at Parx two back, and will have Sheldon Russell in the irons. Russell and McMahon are scoring at 28 percent with a positive ROI.
