Forevamo, Tour de Force clash

Okay, so it is not Sunday Silence vs. Easy Goer, or even Arrogate against California Chrome, but the head-to-head matchup in the featured eighth race Friday at Fair Grounds is compelling.

In one corner, Forevamo, whose best performances last year at 3 were runner-up finishes to Gun Runner in the Risen Star Stakes and to Sharp Azteca in the Pat Day Mile.

In the other corner, Tour de Force, a massive, gorgeous colt who only made the races at the end of his 3-year-old season last year but has emerged as one of the more exciting older prospects this winter at Fair Grounds.

Those are the chief combatants among seven entrants in a second-level allowance race also open to $40,000 claimers and carded for one mile and 70 yards on dirt. The other five in the race are better than mere filler, and Salsa’s Return, fourth last month in the $100,000 Maxxam Gold Cup at Sam Houston, might be the best of them right now.

Forevamo made good progress through the 2015-16 Fair Grounds season, and though he regressed somewhat in the Louisiana Derby following his fine Risen Star run, he bounced back into form when closing steadily for second in Sharp Azteca’s fast Pat Day Mile. Forevamo ran below his best form while finishing a distant sixth in the West Virginia Derby on Aug. 6 in his final start as a 3-year-old, but he was back in action Feb. 17 at Fair Grounds with a good effort at Friday’s class level and distance.

Forevamo, trained for the Brittlyn Stable by Al Stall, raced on a solid pace that day, took the lead in upper stretch, but was engaged in the final furlong by a good horse named Egyptian and lost by a nose. A handicapper from the outside might guess that Forevamo had tired in his first race after a layoff, but Stall said his charge came back to the barn bouncing.

Forevamo, as he has done before, waited on rivals after making the lead. Stall wants to give the colt a chance to figure out how to finish the job on his own rather than slapping on a set of blinkers to try to focus him.

And neither is Tour de Force a fully baked cake. A son of Tiznow trained by Mark Casse, Tour de Force was too big for his own good as a 2- and 3-yearold, but he has grown into his frame and has gotten on a good pattern this winter at Fair Grounds.

Second while debuting in a sprint, Tour de Force was entered for grass second out because it was the only twoturn race available at the time. He won, but his connections believed dirt routes would prove his calling, and that appeared to be the case Feb. 16, when Tour de Force was a strong first-level allowance winner. He was still green in the homestretch, and if Tour de Force really still does have room to grow – figuratively, at least – he could wind up a stakes horse by this summer.