Preview – Garden City G1
Belmont Park
Today’s 8th race at Belmont is the Grade 1 $300K Garden City Stakes for three-year old fillies at 1 and 1/8 miles on the inner turf. With all the rain in the New York area, the turf track will likely be yielding. In fact, all of Saturday’s turf races were taken off the turf except for the Garden City.
Changes: The undefeated Maram was scratched and Jose Lezcano switched to the #3 Don’t Forget Gil replacing Julien Leparoux. Also, Cornelio Velazquez will replace Garret Gomez on #4 Miss World.
Gozzip Girl is the deserving favorite after an impressive win in the American Oaks at Hollywood. Kent Desormeaux is her regular rider and he figures to have her in the hunt from the start.
I like both the #6 Shared Account and the #7 Pull Dancer. Shared Account has a great trainer / jockey combination (Ramon Dominguez & Graham Motion) and the work tab shows she’s been training great and should be primed. Her win in the G2 Lake Placid at Saratoga over soft turf shows she can handle wet conditions over good competition.
The #7 Pull Dancer seems to relish soft turf judging from her win by open lengths in a $50K Optional Claimer on the 3rd of August at Saratoga in a 11 horse field.
I’m a fan of #9 Keertana; I was fortunate to have her on top of a nice paying trifecta in the G3 Regret Stakes at Churchill Downs on the Stephen Foster undercard. However, I’m concerned by several factors: the far outside post position, previous jockey Jose Lezcano’s decision to ride another entrant; and the lack of demonstrated form over yielding turf. Keertana can hit the board but skeptical of her chances to win although her post-time odds should be appealing.
The #2 Katara is very attractive at what looks to be a nice price and she’s getting better each and every race. Has yet to win a stakes race, but as a 3 year old, I doubt we’ve seen the best of her yet. A step forward puts her in contention.
Okay, so here’s my play focusing on the exacta pool:
$10 exacta 6, 7 w/ (on top of) 1, 2, 9; 2 w/ 6, 7; and a 6/7 box. This is a $100 total bet covering 10 of 56 possible exacta combinations. A major worry is a win by #1 Gozzip Girl but I’m betting she may not be fresh after the 2-month layoff and she doesn’t handle the yielding turf. Putting #2 Katara on top of Shared Account and Pull Dancer is a swing for the fences, but certainly not out of the question.
