Quote:
Originally Posted by classhandicapper
IMO, they both ran a terrific race, but 6 pounds, a controlled pace, and a well timed incredibly strong left handed finish by Irad made the difference.
No disrespect to the winner who is obviously much improved this year. But personally, I'm very surprised. I thought either Monomoy Girl, Swiss Skydiver or both would have enough speed to get to Latruska on the 2nd turn and once they did they'd out-finish her. I was right about the development, but she turned MG back. Amazing.
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Letruska also already had 3 starts under her belt this campaign while the 2 favorites had made a single start each.
Monomoy Girl, like last year, started her campaign with a relatively low BSF. But last year, she had 8 weeks between starts, had a consistent worktab, and caught a relatively soft field in a Grade 2. This year, she came back on 6 weeks rest and for some reason also took almost 3 weeks to work back from the Bayakoa and then missed another work in early April (15 days between her last 2 workouts).
Swiss Skydiver got a big BSF at Santa Anita, but it was the only 2-turn dirt race on the card and for what it's worth the 7 furlong split in her race was slower than both a 4-horse maiden special weight and a low-level claimer (both run at 7f). Her final 1/8 was also slower than the maiden special weight (granted the winner was a debuting 1/2 to American Pharoah). Most of the Beholder entrants were eligible for a NW2x allowance (in fact one of them just ran well beaten 2nd to last year's Apple Blossom winner in an allowance race today at SA).
Swiss Skydiver was also training all winter in FL, shipped to CA to run, shipped back to FL to train some more, shifted over to KY to train up to this race, then shipped to AR to run. It remains to be seen if McPeek has already blown all the benefits the filly got from the much needed respite after last year's disastrous BC run.
