The Acorn – Grade I
1 1/8 Mile Dirt Stake Purse $500.000 Filly 3-Year-Olds.

1st Let Me Explain Mb Stables Velazquez J R

This race seemed to go the way of a vast majority of the bigger stakes races this year with the two stables that have multiple runners and win more often than not sharing out the top places between them. In the KYO it was Wasted Away and Fractious, in the Acorn it was Let Me Explain and Mb Stables. One thing that seems pretty clear is that this horse will not run to its form if it even looks at a glass of water before the race. In the KYO the official going was good, and it faded down the stretch like a cheap claimer. In the Southwest, it was the same thing, a little shower of rain and she weakened away down the stretch. But given a dry track, there is no doubt that this filly knows exactly what it needs to do to win, and the AI rode the perfect tactics to get her revenge today. Stalking the lead, she kicked clear into the stretch and set up the sort of lead that closers on this new engine rarely if ever catch. The final margin was a quarter length and getting smaller, but it was enough to see her regain the top spot of her division.

2nd Wasted Away Fractious Moore R L

In the KYO, the off-track slowed the leaders enough for this filly to use her closing speed to get the timing just right, today a faster track and the winner had pinched enough of a lead that the gap was just too big to make up in a furlong. Her running style will lose her more races than she wins, but I do feel she is a more complete dirt router than the rest of the fillies in this division and if she can maintain her condition through the year, she may turn out to be the best three-year-old filly in training.

3rd Purple Charger Fractious Franco M

She ran up to her KYO run in finishing third here, and like her stable mate, was doing all her best work late in the race. It wouldn’t take much for her to win these big races, and I think her time will come when the AI favors her as it did in the Ashland.

4th Nazca Lines Delta Farms Gallardo A A

Beat Let Me Explain in both the Fantasy and the KYO, but today the rather random form lines saw her back in fourth. She is very close to the best in this division, and it will only take another day and another race for her to possibly improve on this finishing position and get back to winning ways.

Categories: Grade I, STAKES ARTICLES