Jackson Bend surprised Shackleford and Caleb’s Posse to win the Carter Handicap
With the favourite, Calibrachoa, scratched from the Grade 1, $400,000 Carter Handicap at Aqueduct race course due to a quarter crack which necessitated the defection, it was anybody’s race. The race was cut down to only 5 runners’, but it still had the likes of the Grade 1 Preakness Stakes 2011 champion, Shackleford and the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile winner, Caleb’s Posse.
Robert V. LaPenta and Jacks or Better Farm owned 5-year-old horse, Jackson Bend was the longest shot in the field, and compare to the two millionaires, he wasn’t expected to challenge them like he did.
With Shackleford weakening in the final stretch after leading throughout the race, Jackson Bend replaced him as the leader, but with a furlong to go, Caleb’s Posse roared in and challenged Jackson Bend to the wire.
It was Jackson Bend’s heroics to keep the flying even money choice at bay to win the $400,000 Carter Handicap, and has now two wins out of 3 starts for the 2012 campaign.
“The way he was moving, I felt I’d get next to Shackleford, let Shackleford do a little of the dirty work and go," Nakatani said. "And once I got around the turn I was going to see where I was at. When Caleb’s Posse started coming at me … this horse has so much heart. It brings a tear to my eye. He’s Mighty Mouse. He’s so little, 15 hands, but he’s got so much heart.”
Sent at the odds of 9 to 2, Jackson Bend covered the seven furlong distance in 1 minute and 22.32 seconds, and the Florida bred son of Hear No Evil, out of mare s**y Stockings by Tabasco Cat, Jackson Bend notched his 4th consecutive win over the seven furlong distance and handed hi connections a second Carter in 2 years.
Trainer Nick Zito, who trains Jackson Bend, won the 2011 edition of the Grade 1 Carter Handicap with Morning Line.
Emcee, who was expected to set the pace lost his footing coming out of the gate, but under jockey Jesus Castanon, Shackleford carved early fractions. Jackson Bend, who sat off the pace in fourth progressed off the turn and left behind Shackleford, but in no time Caleb’s Posse conjured up a fast run which was held by Jackson Bend by a head.
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