Outspoken Jones makes it clear about the weight, regarding Havre de Grace’s next race
Trainer Larry Jones still feels he and owner Rick Porter including the 2011 champion Horse of the Year, Havre de Grace, was hard done by in the Grade 2 Delaware Handicap last year, which the mare lost by a nose to her arch rival, Blind Luck, who is now retired.
Jones was fairly open about the subject, and said that it was beyond him that a grade 1 winning filly, Blind Luck, who did it in California was assigned a weight of 122 pounds and a grade 1 in New York, Life at Ten, was given 117 pounds, and his filly was
assigned a weight of 124 pounds. The races was a real close one as Havre de Grace led in the stretch, but was agonizingly nosed out in the last strides by Blind Luck.
The discussion stemmed from Havre de Grace’s next start after winning the New Orleans Ladies Stakes by barely breaking a sweat. The next target for Havre de Grace is the Grade 1, $500,000 Apple Blossom Handicap on 13 April, which the champion mare won last
year.
The connections have made one thing real clear that they are not going to be stupid about the weight anymore, and will not let the Delaware Handicap situation occur again this year, and under right weight conditions they will enter Havre de Grace in the
Apple Blossom Handicap, and even the Grade 2, $350,000 Oaklawn Handicap on 14 April, 2012.
If Oaklawn Park assigns Havre de Grace too much weight, than Porter and Jones already have a plan B to fall back on, and that would be go somewhere else, or even wait for the Grade 1, $400,000 Ogden Phipps Handicap at Belmont Park on 28 May, 2012.
“Look, we know we’re going to have to carry more weight than most horses in the country.” Jones said, “We understand that. But I’m also not fixing to give a multiple grade I winner a lot of weight just because we have an Eclipse Award that was done off of
votes and doesn’t take into account what happened on the racetrack. I’m not going to spot a lot of weight to a horse that has as many grade Is as we have.”
Tags: