Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Gun Runner, Arrogate get in final workouts
DEL MAR, Calif. – Only hours before they were entered in the Breeders’ Cup Classic and made the top two betting choices in their showdown for Horse of the Year on Saturday, Gun Runner and Arrogate turned in their final workouts for the race on Monday, with both appearing to come into the Classic as good as desired.
Gun Runner and Arrogate both had been training in recent weeks at Santa Anita, but Gun Runner came here to Del Mar late last week and turned in his final work at the track where the Classic will be run, going a half-mile by himself which Daily Racing Form timed in 49.62 seconds.
A little later in the morning, Arrogate worked at Santa Anita, going five furlongs – from the half-mile pole to the sevenfurlong pole – in 1:00 after leaving his workmate at the finish line, a half-mile into the drill.
Gun Runner has shown he’s aware a race is near. Scott Blasi, the assistant to trainer Steve Asmussen, said he “just swelled up” in stature following a sharp workout at Santa Anita last week.
Monday’s work “was perfect,” Blasi said.
“He had a couple of good gallops here and his energy level is good,” Blasi said. “I thought the work was beautiful. He’s been so consistent all year.”
Blasi said Gun Runner was scheduled to have a schooling session in the paddock on Thursday afternoon.
This will be the 10th track at which Gun Runner has competed.
“He seems to get over whatever we put him on,” Blasi said. “I don’t think that will make much difference.”
Surface certainly is paramount among concerns for handicappers with Arrogate, who lost twice at Del Mar this summer. His trainer, Bob Baffert, insists his management of the horse, not the surface, is to blame. Arrogate has progressed well in recent weeks at Santa Anita, with workouts that are more in line with what he had during the height of his career from August 2016 through March 2017.
His work Monday “went nice,” Baffert said. “Everything went great.”
Baffert also worked Classic runner Mubtaahij. He went a half-mile in 49.80 seconds.
At Del Mar, Classic longshot Win the Space worked a halfmile in 49.60 seconds for trainer George Papaprodromou.
– Jay Privman
Baffert readies Classic quartet
It’ll be four (for trainer Bob Baffert) against one (for Steve Asmussen) in the Breeders’ Cup Classic on Saturday at Del Mar, with Baffert sending out Arrogate, Collected, Mubtaahij, and West Coast against Asmussentrained Gun Runner.
“He’s the only thing between me and a big, fat check,” Baffert said of Gun Runner.
Baffert’s quartet marks the first time any trainer has had more than three runners in the Classic.
“Hopefully they’re all out there trying to win,” said Asmussen, who said he’d instruct Gun Runner’s jockey, Florent Geroux, “to watch the Shared Belief Awesome Again a couple of times.”
In the 2014 Awesome Again Stakes at Santa Anita, Baffert had two horses – Fed Biz and Sky Kingdom – entered against Shared Belief, who was trained by Jerry Hollendorfer. The
longshot Sky Kingdom fanned out Shared Belief on both turns before fading to finish last, but Shared Belief gutted out a neck victory over Fed Biz.
In Shared Belief’s next start, Bayern – also trained by Baffert – beat Shared Belief in the Breeders’ Cup Classic in a race that had a controversially messy start between Bayern and Shared Belief. Stewards reviewed video and unanimously ruled no change.
– Jay Privman
O’Brien set for 13 runners
Two trainers, barring the unfortunate before Friday and Saturday, will have 13 runners in Breeders’ Cup races, the most of any horsemen this year. One of them, Chad Brown, is based in New York. The other goes about his business in Ireland.
Aidan O’Brien had 11 Breeders’ Cup runners in 2011 and 12 last year at Santa Anita, but the first Breeders’ Cup at Del Mar has brought out the largest shipment of O’Brien runners yet. Fourteen in all were en route to California on Monday, with Declaration of peace slated for the Juvenile Turf Sprint and the other 13 in Breeders’ Cup races.
O’Brien will have runners in the Classic, Turf, Mile, Filly and Mare Turf, Juvenile, Juvenile Turf, Juvenile Fillies Turf, and Turf Sprint. It will be a surprise if he does not win at least one race.
O’Brien already has set a record this year winning 26 Group 1 or Grade 1 races, surpassing the 25 Bobby Frankel won in 2003. And with 111 Breeders’ Cup starters going into this year’s races, O’Brien has run more horses in the Breeders’ Cup than any trainer save Wayne Lukas (164) and Todd Pletcher (128).
The Breeders’ Cup refers to its races as World Championships, and Aidan O’Brien, all by himself, is lending plenty of weight to that characterization.
– Marcus Hersh
Golden Dragon to Juvenile
Trainer Mikhail Yanakov listed the Juvenile Turf as his first preference over the Juvenile for Golden Dragon when he pre-entered him for both races on Oct. 23. On Monday, Golden Dragon seemed to show a preference for the dirt as he blazed five furlongs in 58.97 seconds over Del Mar’s main track in preparation for his dirt debut in Saturday’s $2 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.
Golden Dragon, whose only two wins have come on the turf, would not have made it into Friday’s Juvenile Turf field as he was too far down the preference list in a race that drew 27 pre-entrants. Only 13 were pre-entered for the Juvenile, a race that permits 14 and drew a field of 12.
Yanakov said he decided to pre-enter the Juvenile because he was impressed with how well Golden Dragon had trained over that surface at Keeneland. He impressed yet again Monday as, under jockey Evin Roman, he went in splits of 11.69 seconds, 23.26, 35.15, and a final quarter of 23.82. seconds. He galloped out six furlongs in 1:13.09.
“Amazing,” Yanakov said. “He never touched him. The jockey said, ‘If I touched him he’s going to go 57.’ But a breeze is a breeze and a race is different. Let’s see what happens Saturday.”
Roman, the leading apprentice rider in the nation who was the second leading rider at Del Mar’s summer meet, will ride Golden Dragon. Carlos Marquez Jr., who rode Golden Dragon to victories in his last two starts, was injured last week in a spill at Hawthorne.
Yanakov said a more highprofile rider “may not try too hard,” on Golden Dragon, who will be a longshot in the Juvenile. “This kid is doing good,” Yanakov said. “This his first Breeders’ Cup, this is my first Breeders’ Cup, he’s a good jockey, let’s go.”
◗ Also working Monday for the Juvenile was the maiden Bahamian, who went a halfmile in 49.63 seconds.
Bahamian finished second in both of his starts at Del Mar during the summer. He finished ninth in the Grade 1 Champagne at Belmont after stumbling at the break.