Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Mind Your Biscuits looks best
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – The Dubai Golden Shaheen is not supposed to be a handicap, but it kind of worked out that way. The best horse in the race, Mind Your Biscuits, was saddled with post 14 for the dirt race over 1,200 meters, or about six furlongs.
“It’s not what we would have chosen,” said trainer Chad Summers.
If Mind Your Biscuits can overcome the draw, he’ll give Summers his first win as a head trainer in a Group 1, $2 million stakes race. Summers has worked in racing publicity, in various capacities on the backstretch, and as a bloodstock agent. He is a co-owner of Mind Your Biscuits, a horse he selected for purchase as a yearling, and took over Mind Your Biscuits’s training earlier this year.
In his one start for Summers, Mind Your Biscuits rallied strongly to finish second by a neck in the Gulfstream Park Sprint to the good horse Unified. Had the race been run at Meydan, where the homestretch is much longer, Mind Your Biscuits would have won.
Prior to that start, Mind Your Biscuits had been third in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint and won the Grade 1 Malibu at Santa Anita.
Mind Your Biscuits turned a corner when he began racing without blinkers last summer; he appears to be for real.
“We’re thrilled right now, sitting on go,” Summers said.
The Shaheen, when it has been run on dirt, historically has been dominated by Americans, and there are two more this year, Stallwalkin’ Dude and St. Joe Bay. Stallwalkin’ Dude is a 7-year-old with 50 starts and an iron constitution: He ran 11 times in 2016 and already has raced twice this year. He also has a tough draw on the rail and looked better training earlier this week than later.
The 5-year-old St. Joe Bay might be a more serious contender. His three-race winning streak in California includes two graded stakes, but the competition in those races was not strong for the class level, as the American dirt-sprint ranks have become oddly barren lately. St. Joe Bay has battled for the lead on a fast pace and drawn clear in all three of those wins and is in career-best form.
“He always trained like he had this in him, but until we consistently sprinted him, we could never seem to find his niche,” said trainer Peter Miller. “He’s probably the fastest horse in the race. I don’t think anyone else has 21-and-2 first-quarter speed like him.”
Muarrab won the Shaheen last year but has not looked like the same animal this winter, and among the local contingent, perhaps the American expatriate Cool Cowboy has the best chance. On international ratings, the top horse is Hong Kong’s Not Listenin’tome, and while he never has raced on dirt, he has an excellent trainer in John Moore and looked energetic while training on dirt late this week.
Sharp Azteca faces challenge
Sharp Azteca has traveled to Dubai from North America to start as the favorite in the Group 2, $1 million Godolphin Mile, and to win, he must find a way to beat a horse named North America.
Those appear to be the two principals in the first event on the World Cup program, an 1,800-meter dirt race run around one turn. The distance and configuration appear to be ideal for Sharp Azteca, who is 4 for 4 in one-turn miles, including an eye-catching score Feb. 11 in the Gulfstream Park Handicap. There, Sharp Azteca dueled early for the lead and pulled away late, and trainer Jorge Navarro said the speedy Sharp Azteca actually benefits from early pace pressure.
“I really hope someone goes out there with him,” Navarro said. “That’s what he likes. Sometimes he gets lost if he’s out there by himself.”
Navarro came to Dubai for the first time last year and saw the heavily favored X Y Jet
get knocked off in the Golden Shaheen. Sharp Azteca is a different sort of horse, according to Navarro.
“The horse last year, he had issues,” he said. “This one we can train the right way.”
The 7-year-old, heavily raced Heavy Metal has won his last two starts by more than 10 lengths combined, and the Japanese horse Kafuji Take is pretty good, but North America definitely looks like Sharp Azteca’s main rival.
A 5-year-old by Dubawi trained by Satish Seemar, North America is 3 for 3 on dirt, all during this winter season in Dubai, and won them by a combined 17 lengths. North America has early speed and might be just the company Navarro is looking for – unless he proves to be more company than Sharp Azteca can handle.