Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Curlin’s Honor gets experience – and a victory
Trainer Mark Casse has another talented Fair Groundsbased 3-year-old who has come a little late to the party along the Triple Crown trail.
The Casse-trained Curlin’s Honor ran his career record to two wins from two starts, overcoming trouble and a layoff of more than four months to win a first-level allowance race Sunday. He joins the barn’s debut winner Telekinesis as clearly talented young horses under the care of assistant trainer David Carroll this winter in New Orleans.
Neither Curlin’s Honor’s margin of victory (a neck), nor his final six-furlong time (1:11.62) or the 78 Beyer Speed Figure it produced told the whole tale of his performance.
Racing between horses much of the trip, Curlin’s Honor and Corey Lanerie got stuck behind a wall of rivals in midstretch. Lanerie finally gave up trying to find a hole, steered outside, and Curlin’s Honor accelerated rapidly to just get up. Lanerie then urged his mount out strongly around the far turn and onto the backstretch, an extra bit of post-race work.
“I think he got three races of experience from that,” Casse said. “We had talked about the gallop-out, but in the end it wasn’t really planned. Corey felt like with all the trouble he had, he wanted to make him go ahead and go on out.”
Curlin’s Honor caught the eye long before he won his career debut, a Keeneland sprint, over the decent colt Fascilitator last fall. He fetched $475,000 at a yearling auction and was pinhooked last May for $1.5 million at a breeze-up sale. Casse trains Curlin’s Honor, a son of Curlin and the Stormin Fever mare Franscat, for John Oxley and Breeze Easy LLC.
“I wasn’t crazy about how he was doing last fall,” Casse said. “He’s come back good. The time off let him develop some. He really changed a lot, lengthened out. In the fall, he looked more a sprinter type, but now he looks like a horse that would get some ground.”
Casse said there are “several options” for Curlin’s Honor, mentioning the Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn and the Lexington at Keeneland as particular possibilities.
Telekinesis is one race and one win behind Curlin’s Honor, but appears to be at least as talented. His flashy debut win Feb. 9 produced a 90 Beyer, and Telekinesis, an Ontario-bred son of Ghostzapper, had his first work since the race when he went a half-mile in 47.80 on Saturday.
“He worked super,” Casse said. “We’re looking for a one-other-than around two turns. When and where it comes I’m not sure yet.”
Arklow back with a bang
Arklow won his first start following a layoff of nearly seven months when he captured a second-level turf allowance race Saturday. Arklow got up by just a neck, but rallied from far behind a relatively slow pace while racing a distance, about 1 1/16 miles, that’s short of his best.
“I thought he ran really well,” trainer Brad Cox said. “He was ridden the way he has to be ridden, which is get him out in the middle of the track and let him do his thing. He’s a big horse with a big stride. He beat a solid group of horses, and he’s only going to get better with more distance.”
More distance is what Arklow will get March 24 in the 1 1/8-mile Muniz Memorial Handicap on the Louisiana Derby undercard. Arklow, whose Sunday win yielded a 90 Beyer Speed Figure, won the Grade 2 American Turf last May at Keeneland, then went off form in the Belmont Derby and the Hall of Fame Stakes before going to the sidelines.
Cox might have a second Muniz starter. Mr. Misunderstood, second last out to Synchrony in the Fair Grounds Handicap, still is under consideration for the race, but Cox said the Maker’s 46 Mile at Keeneland also is an option for Mr. Misunderstood, who won his first eight turf starts before the recent defeat.
Girvin legging up for return
Girvin, who won the Grade 1 Haskell Stakes last summer and the $1 million Louisiana Derby last spring, is progressing toward his 4-year-old debut, trainer Joe Sharp said.
Girvin, who peaked in the Haskell and most recently finished fifth last fall in the Oklahoma Derby at Remington Park, has worked twice at owner Brad Grady’s Grand Oaks Farm in Florida. He was scheduled to breeze again early this week, Sharp said, and soon will be shipped into Sharp’s barn at Fair Grounds.
◗ Wynn Time, who has five wins and a second from six career starts, is scheduled to make his stakes debut March 10 at Oaklawn Park in the $125,000 Hot Springs Stakes, trainer Hugh Robertson said.
One of the top Illinois-breds in training, Wynn Time, a John Mentz homebred by Three Hour Nap, won his first two starts last year in Chicago, finished a solid second in November at Fair Grounds, and since has ripped through his first-, second-, and thirdlevel allowance conditions at this meet. Robertson said he’d work Wynn Time about a week before the Hot Springs before shipping the 4-year-old gelding to Arkansas.
◗ Headlining the Thursday card at Fair Grounds is a second-level turf-sprint allowance race also open to $40,000 claimers. Ten are in the field’s main body, with two more entered for the main track only. Dark Arden is the choice to post an off-the-pace upset, provided the race stays on turf. On dirt, Restless Rambler could lead from start to finish.