Haynesfield strikes in Jockey Club Gold Cup
Blame took the spotlight in an all-star show at Belmont Park but was Garrett Gomez dazzled?
Five Grade One races made this the most informative card of the weekend in terms of the Breeders’ Cup and Blame was supposed to make his case as a contender for the Classic with a victory in the Jockey Club Gold Cup.
The dirt was packed for a fast time but what they got was some shrewd tactics from Steve Asmussen (pictured) and Ramon Dominguez as Haynesfield ran out the clear winner. Haynesfield, who had been only fourth to Blame in the Grade One Whitney Handicap at Saratoga in August, was put into an uncontested lead while Gomez sat off the pace on Blame.
But with no zest to the tempo Gomez then found himself trying to catch a leader who had been able to run as he liked and Haynesfield came down the home stretch with Dominguez sitting quietly in the saddle as he came home four lengths clear of Blame.
Gomez said after the race: “At the half-mile pole Ramon’s horse hit another gear and started going, there wasn’t nothing I could do about it.
“My horse down the lane never really bore down and ran because that horse was so far in front of him. He didn’t have anything to look at in the eye. He ran good, but I was hoping he’d run a little better."
Blame’s trainer, Al Stall, did not seem unduly worried but it was hardly the ideal prep for the Classic.
The Beldame Stakes had lost something, as had all of American racing, when Rachel Alexandra had been scratched from the race and retired from racing earlier this week.
There was still and Persistently, whose defeat of Rachel Alexandra in the Grade One Personal Ensign Stakes at Saratoga last month had hastened the retirement of the 2009 Horse of the Year, but she was never in with a chance this time, which may say more about how Rachel Alexandra had dropped from her mighty heights of last year. By comparison Todd Pletcher’s Life At Ten goes from strength to strength. She had finished third in the Personal Ensign but now she surged past Queen Martha and Unrivalled Belle for John Velazquez and then powered down the stretch from Unrivalled Belle, with Persistently a well-beaten third.
Having won his first British Group One races this year at Ascot last Saturday, with Poet’s Voice and White Moonstone, Saeed bin Suroor saddled his first Grade One winner in America for 2010 when Girolamo, ridden by Alan Garcia, won the Vosburgh Stakes. Girolamo, who blew out when tried over 10 furlongs in last year’s Classic, looks like a decent contender for the Sprint after beating Riley Tucker by two-and-a-half lengths. Girolamo lost his early pitch for the lead but was never worse than third, behind Wall Street Wonder, and Garcia took up the lead on the turn as his colt found plenty down the stretch.
With the Breeders’ Cup moving, after two years on the synthetic main track at Santa Anita which had been so helpful to the European runners, to the dirt of Churchill Downs the turf races assume even greater significance this year for the runners from across the Atlantic.
The Joe Hirsch Turf Classic Invitational Stakes was the dress rehearsal for the Turf and Paddy O’Prado was there to stake his claim. And he looked to be on the money as he picked off horses from the turn, only to be gunned down by Winchester, trained by Christophe Clement and ridden by Cornelio Velasquez, who came from stone last to take the lead in last hundred yards.
Ave got up in a driving three-way finish for Javier Castellano to win the Flower Bowl Invitational Stakes but it hardly looked like form that should worry connections of Midday as Henry Cecil prepares his filly to defend her crown in the Filly & Mare Turf. The slow early pace meant that most of the field was still in with a chance hitting the home stretch.
Red Desire, the Japanese runner, got a split between horses to grab the lead on the rail and was then challenged by Changing Skies but Castellano managed to squeeze between the two to nail Changing Skies in the last strides. The winner, now in the barn of Roger Attfield, was formerly trained in Britain by Sir Michael Stoute for whom she was a Group Three winner and if she is setting the standard for the home team it may not be good enough.
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