Lukas: Champion filly ‘ short’ in Saratoga comeback
Blame me, said Hall of Fame trainer Wayne Lukas, for champion filly Take Charge Brandi’s flop in her comeback Saturday at Saratoga Race Course.
Starting for the first time since winning the Jan. 31 Martha Washington at Oaklawn Park, the Arkansas-owned 3- year- old finished last of 10 in the Grade 1 $ 500,000 Test going seven furlongs in upstate New York. Take Charge Brandi had won four consecutive races, three in graded stakes, but was making her first start since undergoing surgery for a knee chip.
“She was short,” Lukas said. “Bad training job. I didn’t have her tight enough.”
Take Charge Brandi set the early fractions but “folded” in the stretch, according to the Equibase. com chart, and finished 24 lengths behind winner Cavorting, trained by former Lukas aide Kiaran McLaughlin.
Take Charge Brandi, owned by Willis Horton of Marshall, prefers to go longer, Lukas said, but he stressed the need “to get her a little tighter.”
Take Charge Brandi ( by Giant’s Causeway) is the second- straight Eclipse Award winner for Lukas and Horton. Will Take Charge won the Grade 2 Rebel and listed Smarty Jones in the 2013 season, which he capped with a Grade 1 victory ( his second of the season) against older horses in Churchill Downs’ Clark Handicap. Will Take Charge won the Grade 2 Oaklawn Handicap as a 4- year- old before retiring to stud.
With the champ: Triple Crown winner American Pharoah is being pointed to the Grade 1 $ 1.6 million Travers Aug. 29 at Saratoga, Bob Baffert, the colt’s Hall of Fame trainer, said Monday.
Baffert said on Bloodhorse. com that owner- breeder Ahmed Zayat “made it clear he wants to run in the Travers, so I’ll give the horse every opportunity, if he’s 100 percent, to do that.”
Attending the yearling sale at Saratoga, Baffert said, “I’m doing recon work checking out what barn he’d be in. When he comes to town it will be like bringing the Beatles. He has such a huge fan base.”
American Pharoah is 6 for 6 this year, becoming the first Triple Crown winner in 37 years and 12th in history with his spring Grade 1 sweep of the Kentucky Derby, Preakness and Belmont Stakes. The Pioneerofthe Nile colt won the Grade 1 Haskell Invitational by 2 1/ 4 lengths under wraps Aug. 2 at New Jersey’s Monmouth Park, 57 days after the Belmont. American Pharoah prepped for the Triple Crown at Oaklawn, winning the Grade 1 Arkansas Derby in April and Grade 2 Rebel in March.
Americah Pharoah is training at Del Mar in Southern California, where he gained his maiden victory in a Grade 1 stake last summer, and, said Baffert, “He still looks like a picture of health. He’s pretty … spectacular. I’ve never seen a horse that’s been on a plane so many times and still holds his form.
“I don’t know what planet this horse is from,” Baffert said. “If they’re going to clone a horse, it should be this one.”
Notes: Oaklawn maiden winners The Pickett Factor and Allied Air Raid ran one- two in the $ 100,000 Super Derby Prelude Saturday at Louisiana Downs, the former earning automatic entry in the Grade 2 $ 400,000 main event Sept. 22. The Pickett Factor, trained by Ralph Irwin, won by a length and a quarter over the Brad Cox- trained Allied Air Raid with a a fast- rated mile and a sixteenth in 1: 44.42. The Super Derby is a mile and an eighth. … Season leaders at Prairie Meadows ( Altoona, Iowa) were owner Danny Caldwell, 50 victories; jockey Ramon Vazquez, 94 wins ( 30 more than runner- up Ken Tohill); and trainer Federico Villafranco ( 5148 over Lynn Chleborad). Caldwell had 18 Oaklawn victories this year, leading the local standings for the secondstraight season. Vazquez finished second to Ricardo Santana Jr. ( 53- 51) at Oaklawn while Villafranco ( 18 wins) tied for third behind winner Chris Hartman and Steve Asmussen. … Live racing at Remington Park ( Oklahoma City) begins Friday with a nine- race card starting at 7 p. m. Mostly racing each Wednesday- Saturday, Remington’s season runs through Dec. 13.