TODAY’S OAKLAWN HANDICAP filled with talent.
HOT SPRINGS — Today’s 70th running of the Grade II, $600,000 Oaklawn Handicap has quantity and quality.
Fourteen horses, the maximum allowed in the gate at Oaklawn Racing Casino Resort, are entered, and these are horses with noted accomplishments.
“I can’t think of anybody we’re missing,” Racing Secretary Pat Pope said Friday afternoon, running down the list of contenders.
It’s a list that includes six horses who are coming off victories in a graded stakes race, the highest quality offered in North American racing, and a handful of others who are just starting their season.
Pope used Tacitus, one of the nation’s top 3-year-olds last season, as an example of a horse that was not originally pointed to Oaklawn when he set off to run in the $20 million Saudi Cup in late February.
Trainer Bill Mott planned to keep Tacitus in the Middle East for the Dubai World Cup in late March, but the outbreak of the coronavirus canceled that event and nearly left Tacitus stranded.
Tacitus, listed at 9-2 on the morning line, made it back to New York and was given six weeks off when Pope said he checked with the Hall of Famer Mott to tell him Oaklawn would love to have his gray son of Tapit run in Hot Springs.
Pope said he understood that racing Tacitus in Arkansas was not the original plan.
“When I talked to Bill 2-3 weeks ago, he was like, ‘Let’s see how he works,’ ” Pope said.
Tacitus, a two-time Grade
II winner and earner of more than $2.6 million, worked 5 furlongs on April 20, and then added another 5-furlong work five days ago at the Belmont training track.
“All I can say, after talking to him, is Bill must have liked his last work,” Pope said. “The horse is back there. He must like what he saw to come this far.”
Tacitus may be the biggest name in the field, along with
Bob Baffert-trained Improbable, but there are others with noteworthy credentials.
Southern California shipper Combatant, now in the barn of John Sadler, is coming off a victory in the Grade I Santa Anita Handicap two months ago.
Louisiana-based By My Standards, a Kentucky Derby participant last year, is a two-time Grade II winner at Fair Grounds, winning the Louisiana Derby last year and the New Orleans Classic six weeks ago.
From Florida, there is Mr Freeze, an earner of more than $1.3 million and recent winner of the Grade II Gulfstream Park mile.
Identifier, a late-blooming 4-year-old, won the the Grade III Hal’s Hope Handicap in his last start, and Trophy Chaser, another Florida shipper, won the Grade III Challenger Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs seven weeks ago.
Then there are the local horses.
Bravazo, a winner of more than $2 million and trained by
D. Wayne Lukas, is one of the race’s longer shots.
Trainer Brad Cox has two entrants — Black Ops, winner of the Essex Handicap on March 14, and stablemate Warrior’s Charge, who won the Grade III Razorback Handicap on Feb. 17.
Night Ops is 15-1 on the morning line and Warrior’s Charge, the fourth-place finisher in the Preakness, is listed at 8-1 in a field that will make him work hard to get the early lead he likes.
“You’ve got the Oaklawn older horses,” Pope said. “You’ve got the Razorback winner. You got the Essex winner. You got the New Orleans Handicap winner. You got Improbable.
“You got them all.” Post time for the Oaklawn Handicap, the 12th race on a season-ending 14-race card, is 6:04 p.m.
Pope said the attitude of horsemen around the country is one of willingness to take advantage of the few opportunities there are to race with Oaklawn and Gulfstream, the two remaining major racing centers still active.
Dale Romans, trainer of Mr. Freeze, was one of the men Pope was talking about.
“I know you’re a tough race,” Pope said, recalling his conversation. “But he said I’m going to come.”