Company lines tout Irap in Ohio Derby

NEW YORK – With a very light stakes schedule for a summer Saturday, the Grade 3, $500,000 Ohio Derby at Thistledown is easily the richest race of the day. Santa Anita has a Grade 3, $100,000 stakes doubleheader with the Affirmed and Precisionist, but while the Precisionist is interesting, both races drew fields of only five. The only other graded stakes on Saturday is the Grade 3, $100,000 Chicago Handicap at Churchill Downs.

One other note before we get started: The three stakes races I chose this week – as always, the three most interesting betting propositions, in my opinion – have scheduled post times within a span of only nine minutes. This is not a good thing on any racing day. But on a Saturday with hardly any stakes races to be found, let alone playable ones, the poor scheduling, is indefensible.

Ohio Derby

It’s never a good idea to take poor efforts in the Kentucky Derby too seriously, and that remains true this year. Look at Tapwrit and Irish War Cry. Neither ran well in the Derby, and they came back to dominate the Belmont Stakes, finishing first and second.

I mention this because this Ohio Derby has four horses who ran poorly in the Kentucky Derby – Girvin, Irap, Untrapped, and Fast and Accurate. Of these four, Girvin had the most obvious excuse for his 13th-place finish at Churchill Downs. He battled a quarter crack in the days leading up to the Derby which compromised his preparation.

That said, I’m still not at all sure of how good Girvin really is. He won the Louisiana Derby and Risen Star prior to the Kentucky Derby, but failed to run especially fast in either of those victories despite getting ideal trips, and the fields he beat were soft. Girvin is the morning-line favorite Saturday at 2-1, and Irap is the second choice at 3-1, and if those prices hold, then Irap would represent solid value to me.

Irap finished a distant 18th in the Kentucky Derby, and I was not a big fan of his 31-1 upset of the Blue Grass Stakes two starts back, where he capitalized on a slow early pace to notch his maiden win. However, the field Irap beat in the Blue Grass was light-years better than anything Girvin has ever beaten.

Among those Irap defeated were two-time Grade 1 winner Practical Joke; onetime Kentucky Derby future-book favorite McCraken, the winner of last week’s Matt Winn Stakes; J Boys Echo, the winner of the Grade 3 Gotham over subsequent Preakness winner Cloud Computing; Belmont Stakes winner Tapwrit; and Wild Shot, who came back with an impressive score in the Grade 3 Pat Day Mile.

Irap’s Blue Grass is good enough to beat Girvin on Saturday. His second to the unlucky Royal Mo in the Robert B. Lewis Stakes early this year might be good enough too.

Chicago Handicap

At the risk of getting burned in two straight weeks in stakes nd at Churchill Downs, I’m going to try to beat the formidable-looking favorite here, Finley’sluckycharm.

Last week, I took a shot against the imposing Gun Runner in the Stephen Foster Handicap based on the expectation that he would be challenged early by two other quality speed horses. Instead, those speed horses took back, handing Gun Runner an easy, uncontested lead that he parlayed into a big score.

Like Gun Runner, Finley’sluckycharm might well be way too good for this field. Her last six Beyer Speed Figures are higher than any figures earned by the other 12 in this race over a total of 209 starts. But Finley’sluckycharm stretches back out to seven furlongs, a distance at which she blew a clear stretch lead in the La Brea late last year, and that could be trouble, especially if Pleasant Tales presses her early.

I’ll go with Sweetgrass. Sweetgrass was pace-compromised most recently when third to Finley’sluckycharm in the Winning Colors, but she ran well in an allowance win and in a fourth in the Humana Distaff in her first two starts this year.

Jersey Shore Stakes

Space Shuttle steps up here off only a maiden victory and is conceding important seasoning, but he’s still my play because I think he might be a good one. Space Shuttle improved significantly in his recent romp at Monmouth, which was also his 3-year-old debut, and can improve again in his second start off the layoff.