Lively early pace in Appleton would benefit Seismic Wave

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Even the first half of the 14-race Saturday card at Gulfstream Park has its points of considerable interest. The Grade 3 Appleton and the Sand Springs, $100,000 turf stakes that drew short but solid lineups, will be among the races to warm up bettors well before the Florida Derby is run as sundown approaches.

The Appleton, for older horses going a two-turn mile, is scheduled to be run as race 6 at 1:57 p.m. Eastern, an hour or so after its filly-mare counterpart, the 1 1/16mile Sand Springs, goes as race 4.

Appleton

There should be early pace aplenty in this 68th running of the Appleton, what with the 7-year-old Frostmourne and the comebacking Gray’s Fable both primed to fly early from their inside posts, not to mention Little Menace exiting a series of dirt sprints. Whether they’ll all make for a ruinous duel to set the table for a capable closer such as Seismic Wave is what horseplayers will be asked to determine as they wade through this field of eight.

Seismic Wave (post 8, Irad Ortiz Jr.) will be making his 17th career start but his first for Chad Brown, who overtook his training after a partnership led by Michael Dubb bought him last fall and subsequently had him gelded. Seismic Wave, now 5, won three times as a 3-year-old but went winless in five tries last year, all in higher-end turf races in New York.

“He’s done well for us up at Payson Park since we got him in over the winter,” said Brown, who has sent him through nine breezes since mid-January at Payson. “Obviously, we’re just getting started back with him, but he should fit a race like this.”

Frostmourne (post 3, Tyler Gaffalione) also is a gelding who underwent a trainer change well into his career, having moved over to Eddie Kenneally after earning the bulk of his $681,608 bankroll for Christophe Clement. The Green Lantern Stables homebred most recently was third as the pacesetter in the Jan. 9 Tropical Turf over the local course.

Other notables in an interesting lineup include Ever Dangerous (post 4, Edgard Zayas), second to a lone-speed winner here in a Feb. 13 allowance after upsetting the Bryan Station last fall at 74-1, and Renaisance Frolic (post 5, Javier Castellano), an earner of nearly $400,000 in 33 starts. Perfect Speighty and Forever Mo complete the cast.

Sand Springs

Both at 2 and 3, Sweet Melania was one of the most consistent turf fillies in her class, finishing first or second in every start except for her a third-place finish behind Sharing in the 2019 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf at Santa Anita.

That is, until the Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland last fall, when Sweet Melania inexplicably faltered to finish last in a field of seven. Duly regrouped over the winter by trainer Todd Pletcher, Sweet Melania will make her first start versus older horses when she faces six other fillies and mares in the Sand Springs.

Eight workouts since late January at Palm Beach Downs in Delray Beach precede the eagerly awaited return of Sweet Melania, whose feats helped her sire, Triple Crown winner American Pharoah, earn an early reputation as a progenitor of top turf horses. A $600,000 yearling purchase by Robert and Lawana Low, she invariably used a high turn of speed to put herself into her races from start to finish, at least until the Keeneland debacle.

Jose Ortiz, who has ridden Sweet Melania during most of her nine-race career, will reunite with the chestnut filly when they break from post 6 in this fifth running of the Sand Springs. They’ll be among the favorites in a lineup that also includes Abscond (post 5, Tyler Gaffalione), a Grade 1 winner also making her 4-year-old debut, along with a quartet of fillies exiting graded turf stakes held earlier at this championship meet.

Sweet Bye and Bye (post 3, Irad Ortiz Jr.) is among that core group that’s had a run over the local course this winter, having finished second after attending the pace in the Grade 3 Marshua’s River. Bred and owned by former trainer Joe Imbesi, the 6-year-old gray mare is a Pennsylvaniabred star with earnings of $445,300 and a Beyer Speed Figure standard (low to mid90s) to be a major presence here.

The others include Feel Glorious and Art of Almost, a respective third and fifth in the Feb. 27 Honey Fox, and Niko’s Dream, seventh in the Marshua’s River. Rounding out the field is Runway Dreamer.

BARBARA D. LIVINGSTON Seismic Wave, who went 0 for 5 last year as a 4-year-old, will make his first start for trainer Chad Brown in Saturday’s Grade 3 Appleton Stakes at Gulfstream Park.