San Diego Handicap (Grade 2)- $300.000 Purse
DMR- For Three Year Olds and Upward
One Mile and One Sixteenth on the Dirt
July 26, 2025

There’s plenty of exciting race action this weekend, and we’ll take a look at the west coast here in the 23rd running of the San Diego Handicap from DMR. This race has been a Grade 2 ever since it first appeared on the calendar, and there has not been a whole lot that has changed about it during that time. There’s been some purse fluctuation, and the current $300.000 is a high for the race, an amount that has been in place since 2022. Our most recent winner of the San Diego Handicap was One Last Punch Line, for Alydar Stables. He’s still active and running in graded races but doing so now for Saratoga Stud. We’ll have seven taking part in this race, and with one exception the weights that will be carried are between 117 and 119 pounds. Chagrin Falls, who raced in the San Diego Handicap last year as well, will carry 122. Let’s take a closer look at these horses:

1- Fire Chase (Bigking, ridden by J R Velazquez)- Fire Chase has been around, running third in the KYD last year as well as having a decent run in the BEL. He’d be sold by Fractious to Riggins Racing, and just four days after, he ran in the BC Classic, though did not have a good run. He’d disappoint with Riggins, considering the $500.000 investment, and would be dropped into a $20.000 claimer in April. Bigking won a five-way shake and got a win out of him in an open allowance at CD, then brought him back to the graded level with success: running second in the Salvator Mile at MTH last month, beaten only by Disciplinary. This is a great spot for him, as he will carry just 117 pounds.

2- Parisian Arrow (Asgar, ridden by E Jaramillo)- With just two wins in sixteen starts, Parisian Arrow has been an underachiever for most of his career. He’s typically competitive, running second in the $400.000 Prince of Wales stakes last fall, and fourth again last month in the Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap. In each case, he was only beaten by a length. He’s close, and on a lot of his race lines, you’ll see him losing by that nagging length. That’s why I call him an underachiever, it seems like he’s on the cusp of being a much better horse than he has been thus far. Asgar just has to get him a length quicker. Given that, is it ironic that he’s out of a horse named Achilles Heel?

3- Frenchman (Threshold, ridden by B Curtis)- We can look back far in his past performances to see graded experience, including the AR Derby, back in 2023, but he’s mainly been a runner in overnights. Since leaving Wood Duck Stables, Frenchman has won only once in 12 starts, and he was a lackluster fourth in a five-horse allowance field at RUI last time. So, what’s changed? He’s not going to be sprinting, but he’s not a newbie at running this type of distance, either. He had a beauty of a mile work at WO in January, but later that month was third of five in a SUN allowance. Time for Frenchman to translate those works into race day success.

4- Charming Man (Rock Creek, ridden by P Husbands)- He wasn’t charming enough to keep from being at a slight weight disadvantage to everyone not named Chagrin Falls. Still, 119 pounds carried wouldn’t by itself be something insurmountable. Charming Man was sold on the same day by Fractious as Fire Chase was, and like his rival today, Charming Man ran in the BC four days later. For this one, it was the BC Dirt Mile, but he struggled in the race. In his five races with Rock Creek, the Storming gelding has one win, a good-looking effort in the Grade 3 Challenger Stakes at TAM, but the other four races around it are duds. He’ll need to recapture that March form to have a shot here.

5- Want Rum (Mo Mentum Farm, ridden by M Franco)- The majority of Want Rum’s career has been with Team 7 Illusions, and that includes a few stake appearances, but he was non-factor in all of them. Ultimately, that trainer dropped him into a $50.000 claimer, and Mo Mentum Farm picked him up. Liking what he saw, the trainer put him into the Grade 3 PRM Cornhusker Handicap earlier this month, where he ran in the middle of the field. Now, he’s back on the track again, and this will be his fourth start since June 1st. That doesn’t have to mean anything but should get a casual mention.

6- Red Vino (The Sidley Stud, ridden by P Lopez)- In two of his last three starts, Red Vino took on an off track in a graded race and ended up looking bad. In between those starts, he won the Grade 3 Triple Bend Stakes, a seven-furlong race, at SA. Overall, Red Vino has won the last three times he has been on a dry track, though not all against the type of competition he meets here. Coming to DMR is a good plan to try and get a dry track, and that will be the case here on Saturday. While that’s positive, this is still the toughest challenge of his career.

7- Chagrin Falls (Mo Mentum Farm, ridden by F Geroux)- He’ll have to overcome being the race’s high weight, and the disadvantage is five pounds to most of those he faces here, so you cannot just disregard that aspect. But being the high weight also means you have been winning, and Chagrin Falls has picked up three graded victories since running in this race last year. The biggest win was the Shadwell Turf Mile in October, sending him to the BC Mile. But if you want something more recent than a race nine months ago, how about the Grade 2 Whittingham Stakes two back, in May. That’s a lot of turf, but he did return to the main track three weeks ago for the Grade 2 Suburban and was a solid fourth in a loaded field. He’s the pick if the weights are equal, but five pounds can make a difference.

Prediction: 1-7-6-2

— NS

Categories: Grade II, STAKES ARTICLES