Awesome Saturday steps up

The horses who finished fourth, sixth, seventh, 10th, and 12th in the Grade 3 Fair Grounds Handicap on Feb. 17 are back in a high-end turf-mile allowance, the feature Sunday at Fair Grounds. That is all well and good, but the most interesting horse in the race is not among that quintet.

Awesome Saturday showed plenty of dirt talent last year as a 3-year-old, and his Jan. 25 comeback race following an extended layoff demonstrated he could run on turf, too. Awesome Saturday won that second-level allowance, a turf sprint, with a flashy late run. In Sunday’s eighth race, Awesome Saturday is up a level in class while stretching out to a route, but might be talented enough to repeat.

Awesome Saturday is one of 12 entrants in the third-level allowance, also open to $80,000 claimers, but four horses are entered for the main track only, and the local forecast suggests that quartet will be staying in their barns Sunday.

The five horses exiting the Fair Grounds Handicap are High Noon Rider (fourth), Applicator (sixth), One Mean Man (seventh), Galton (10th), and Great Wide Open (12th). High Noon Rider, who resides in the stable of leading trainer Brad Cox, won a race at this class level before a respectable showing in the Fair Grounds Handicap. But Sunday’s race comes just 15 days after his last start, and it would be imprudent to expect High Noon Rider to do any better than hold his recent form. Maybe that’s good enough, maybe not.

Awesome Saturday has upside. He ran four good races last spring and summer in Kentucky before going over the top in the Indiana Derby, his last start at age 3. His first-level allowance win came around two turns, which suggests Sunday’s stretch-out might not stop him from a second straight win.

Also worth considering is December Seven, who makes his turf debut following very poor showings in his two most recent starts, the first last summer before a layoff, the second Jan. 13 in the Louisiana Stakes. December Seven has back form plenty good enough for this class level and is by Street Sense, whose progeny often act on grass.

The feature is the last of three consecutive allowance races on a solid nine-race card. Race 6 is a high-end Louisiana-bred turf sprint, and race 7 is a secondlevel allowance with a $40,000 claiming option carded for six furlongs on dirt and restricted to fillies and mares. That race will have last-out winner Sister Kan as a defined favorite.

Forever Unbridled drills

Forever Unbridled worked five furlongs in 1:01.60 on Friday at Fair Grounds as she continues her preparations for the $10 million Dubai World Cup on March 31.

Forever Unbridled, coming off six- and seven-furlong works the last two Fridays, galloped out six furlongs in 1:14.60, trainer Dallas Stewart said.

“She worked great, came out of it great,” Stewart said Friday.

Forever Unbridled, the champion older female of 2017, was ridden by John Velazquez when she won the Breeders’ Cup Distaff in her most recent start, but Velazquez has calls at Gulfstream Park on March 31, including on Holy Bull Stakes winner Audible in the Florida Derby. Stewart said he didn’t yet know who would get the mount on Forever Unbridled in the Dubai World Cup.

Snapper Sinclair to work

Snapper Sinclair is scheduled Monday for his first work since he was beaten a nose by Bravazo in the Feb. 17 Risen Star Stakes.

Trainer Steve Asmussen often works horses back nine days after a race, but he elected to wait another week with Snapper Sinclair, who ran hard in finishing third Jan. 13 in the Lecomte Stakes before another gritty front-end performance in the Risen Star.

“He’s not a big horse,” Asmussen said. “He ran hard last time, and we’re giving that performance the respect it deserves.”

Snapper Sinclair will make his next start March 24 in the $1 million Louisiana Derby, and he will be joined by stablemate Retirement Fund. Retirement Fund won his first two starts, Fair Grounds routes, by open lengths, but finished seventh, beaten 19 lengths, while racing over a sloppy track Feb. 19 in the Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn Park.

Retirement Fund has returned to Fair Grounds and, Asmussen said, also is scheduled to work Monday, most likely in company with Snapper Sinclair.

◗ Haskell Stakes winner Girvin arrived Wednesday at Fair Grounds and rejoined trainer Joe Sharp’s barn following a winter break. Girvin began breezing a few weeks ago at owner Brad Grady’s Grand Oaks Farm in Florida.