Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Closing card strong; racing resumes Dec. 3
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – The 2021 Gulfstream Park fall meeting which ends Sunday will go out with a bang, not a whimper, with an 11-race program that includes a pair of $60,000 overnight handicaps.
The open division features the return of trainer Todd Pletcher’s Fearless, winner of the Grade 2 Gulfstream Park Mile early this year. Both races, the second for fillies and mares, will be decided at one mile on the main track.
After Sunday, there will be no racing at Gulfstream until the 2021-22 Championship meet opens on Dec. 3.
Fearless faces just four rivals in the afternoon’s third event while making his first start since finishing third, beaten two lengths by Last Judgment, in the Grade 3 Pimlico Special on May 14. In his two previous outings, Fearless came off an eight-month hiatus to capture the Gulfstream Park Mile before finishing second, just a halflength behind Silver State, in the Grade 2 Oaklawn Handicap.
Fearless was subsequently purchased at the Fasig-Tipton July selected horses of racing age sale by owner Mike Repole.
“He needed a little time after the race at Pimlico and was purchased by Mike during that period,” said Pletcher. “We know he likes Gulfstream, so we’ve kind of geared him to this race. He’s been right on course for it, and it provides a nice bridge to the Harlan’s Holiday.
“When he’s on his game, he’s a really nice horse and he generally runs well fresh. He has natural speed when he chooses to use it, although he went through a phase when he was dropping out of his races a lot and it compromised his chances a few times. But being fresh, I expect him to be prominent early.”
Fearless, the likely favorite, was assigned high weight of 124 pounds with Paco Lopez picking up the assignment.
Girolamo’s Attack will receive a five-pound concession from Fearless, and may prove the one to beat off a threequarter-length victory under similar conditions here four weeks earlier. He too figures to be forwardly placed, along with Midwest invader Cowboy Diplomacy, who has been away since capturing a second-level optional-claiming and allowance race at the Fair Grounds on March 10. Cowboy Diplomacy was trained by Brad Cox at the time but has shipped locally with trainer Brendan Walsh.
Local favorite Eye of a Jedi will look to rebound from a seventh as a tepid favorite behind Girolamo’s Attack in his most recent start. Eye of a Jedi finished fourth, six lengths behind Fearless, in the Gulfstream Park Mile before flattering the race by returning to dominate the Grade 3 Ghostzapper by 5 1/2 widening lengths one month later.
Queen Nekia will carry top weight of 124 pounds and take on seven rivals in the 10th race while making her first start since finishing third in the seven-furlong Pink Ribbon at Charles Town three months ago. Queen Nekia is winless in four starts since launching her 2021 campaign with a victory in the Grade 3 Royal Delta here on Feb. 20.
The field is wide open and also features Dance d’Oro off far and away a career-best performance (93 Beyer Speed Figure) winning a one-mile allowance test here Sept. 24; Helping Lisa D, stepping up in company after dominating allowance opposition by 8 1/4 lengths over a sloppy track last month; and Hallawallah, who led throughout to readily defeat overnight handicap competition going seven furlongs during the spring session.
Pletcher, the perennial leading trainer during the Championship meet, said his stable will not likely be at full strength locally until the middle of January.
“I still have a lot of horses to run at Aqueduct and don’t anticipate having quite the presence at Gulfstream in December that we’d normally have,” Pletcher said. “We do have some horses down there to run in some of the early stakes, including Always Shopping in the Via Borghese and Abaan in the Allen Jerkens.”
Leading jockey Edgard Zayas all but sewed up the fall riding title after posting four victories on Thursday’s program. Three of those wins came for Saffie Joseph Jr., who had salted away another training crown several weeks earlier. Zayas opened the Thursday card by guiding the 7-1 I’ll Finish to a wire-to-wire victory for trainer Eddie Plesa Jr.