Illness rules Lookin At Lucky out of Travers Stakes
Bob Baffert could be forgiven for thinking that it is two steps forwards and one back when it comes to training Lookin At Lucky.
The colt, who stamped himself as the dominant three-year-old colt with his victory in the Grade One Haskell Invitational Handicap at the weekend, has now been ruled out of his next intended race with a temperature.
Bad post-positions draws conspired in a second place in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile last season and a sixth place in the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs in May and, even when the luck of the draw has not taken a hand, the colt’s health is not making life any easier for Baffert.
After Lookin At Lucky had turned potential into solid formbook fact, when he won the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico two weeks after the Derby, Baffert had to back off for a work when the horse succumbed to a temperature.
It déjà vu this weekend for Lookin At Lucky and Baffert could be forgiven for wondering just who he has upset. A stall one draw was not the greatest start to his plans for the Haskell at Monmouth Park on Sunday.
Baffert and Lookin At Lucky’s jockey, Martin Garcia, devised a strategy to work around that problem with Garcia opting not to try and rush Lookin At Lucky from the gates as First Dude and Our Dark Knight led to the first turn. Garcia elected for a wide run around the first turn and down the back stretch, making his move three wide at the top of the home stretch as he came home to win by four lengths.
After the race it was clear that Baffert thinks that the best is yet to come. "His last few works were just phenomenal. He was really working like he never worked before." he said, "and we'd just been waiting for this coming out party.
"I thought going into the Kentucky Derby he was really going to run a big race and the one hole destroyed our chances. It’s so good to see him finally come out of his shell. What a horse. I wish the Derby was in a month."
However, no amount of tactical planning can get around the latest problem for Baffert. The recurrence of the temperature problem, which struck just before the horse was due to be shipped to the trainer’s base in Southern California, means that Lookin At Lucky will not be aimed for the Grade One Travers Stakes at Saratoga on August 28th.
Mike Pegram , a co-owner of Lookin At Lucky, said to the Thoroughbred Times: “It’s not serious, we just expect it to delay him a couple days. We caught it before he was travelling, and you know how it goes, you just use an abundance of caution. Bob will just see how he progresses, but we expect to have him back in California shortly.”
As Baffert goes back to the drawing board the Grade Two Pennsylvania Derby, at Philadelphia Park on September 25th, comes into the reckoning as he attempts to bring Lookin At Lucky to a peak for a run in Breeders’ Cup Classic at Churchill Downs on November 6th.
That would bring a clash with Zenyatta but there is still no definite decision whether the unbeaten queen of American racing will be running in the Grade One Clement L Hirsch Stakes at Del Mar on Saturday.
She is expected to be entered for the race by her trainer, John Shirreffs, but a final decision over whether she tries to extend her 18-race winning streak in a race that she has won for the past two years will not be taken until later in the week.
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