Horse Racing: Wasted Tears dominates the John C. Mabee Stakes
It was too close on Sunday at Delmar when ‘Wasted Tears’ made her bid to win her seventh consecutive race and just barely came out on top. Wasted Tears just refused to lose and faced off against her competition with everything she had to win the $250,000 grade II John C. Mabee Stakes.
The favourite for the race ran her longest distance to date on grass and registered her 10th consecutive first place finish on the surface. She raced on dirt just once and placed 7th. Her trainer Bart Evans sent her out on a dirt track almost two years ago and has tried nothing of the such since.
“It would be better than that if I hadn't run on the dirt,” Evans said. He adding that the horse moved differently on grass while she laboured on dirt. “She just says, 'I like grass.'” This was the horses’ first time at Del Mar and with the $150,000 boast in her earnings, her total stands at $708,598.
The victory did not come easily at all for Wasted Tears. As the race began, Jockey Rajiv Maragh took her into an early lead and got ahead of the field. However there was no opportunity to cement a lead. The competition was on her tail strong and didn’t let up. While Wasted Tears won the race, at no point was she able to extend her lead by more than a length. That is less of a reflection on her and more on the tenacity of her pursuers.
Into the second turn, ‘Lilly Fa Pootz’ with Jockey Joel Rosario put up a determined challenge to the knock Wasted Tears out of first place. The two were head to head into the final stretch of the race right up to the finish. At the wire one could hardly tell which horse actually won. “I wasn't sure I was the winner until I saw the photo,” trainer Evans said after the race. He added that he was unsure how Wasted Tears would run over 9 furlongs. “She had never raced beyond a mile and a sixteenth. You don't know what that last sixteenth is going to be like.”
Rajiv Maragh said that the race was a test for Wasted Tears which she passed like a true winner. “She showed her usual early speed, then just plugged her way around there," said Maragh. He said that at the wire he believed he had won but knew that it had been very close. He said that the challengers inched closer to him from both sides and pushed the filly as hard as she could go.
Along with Lilly Fa Pootz, it was third place finisher ‘Gotta have her’ who moved on Rajiv’s inside. While Gotta have her put up a good effort, she just couldn’t keep up with Lilly Fa Pootz or Wasted Tears as she fell behind. Lilly continued to up the pressure on the race leader and Wasted Tears responded to each one of Lilly Fa Pootz’s advances. Wasted Tears finished 1:47.35 just ahead of Lilly Fa Pootz. “She just wants to win, this mare. She'll do whatever it takes to win.”
Joel Rosario said that the 12-1 odds Lilly had a good run. “I couldn’t ask more of her,” he said. He added that at one point it seemed like he would make it but was not let through by the other filly as Lilly Fa Pootz kept pushing. “My filly was all heart, but today the other one got it.”
Third place finisher, Gotta have her, was the second favourite for the race. Mike Smith said that when he tried to move on the leaders inside at the rail, the mount didn’t respond. “She put the brakes on me. She just wouldn't go up in there. There was room and I was going, but she just wouldn't go.”
Wasted Tears paid $4.20, $3.40 and $2.40. Lilly Fa Pootz gave back $8.20 and $3.60 and rounded out a $30.80 exacta. Gotta Have Her went $2.40 to show.
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