Unusual Heat Turf Classic
$175.000 For Four Year Olds And Up Foaled in CA
1 1/8 miles – Turf
Santa Anita Park – January 17, 2026
Named after probably the most influential CA Bred sire, especially for turf runners, the fourteenth running of the Unusual Heat Turf Classic will be run this coming Saturday at Santa Anita Park. The race has drawn a small field of five with only one last race winner among them and no obvious choice to make it easy on this writer. Here is the run down:
1. Extreme Super Hero (Threshold/A. Fresu) Grade 2 winner of the Del Mar Derby in 2024 finds himself on the rail attempting to find a return to his best form. Purchased for $52.000 last September he made a quick turnaround from auction to the G1 Goodwood where he failed to show very much. He has been given a nice long break since and his morning works indicate that he may have found some of his old spark.
2. Suspect The Worst (Nakamura Stables/J.J. Hernandez) Won four of his ten starts last season including a turf stakes win in The Schiller at Aqueduct. Finished third in the G3 Harlan in his last effort at the end of December. His last work was a very sharp bullet, and for Nakamura he tries his luck in a CA Bred race for the first time in two years.
3. Virtual Handyman (Onlineracingclub.com/U. Rispoli) Makes his first appearance since being claimed last July for $25.000. He won the G2 Secretariat Stakes two years ago but has only appeared in one stakes race since that victory. Somewhat of a mystery horse off of the half a year break but is running holes in the wind in the morning.
4. Extremely Great (The Sidley Stud/L. Dettori) There is a theme of fives for Extremely Great. He is a five-year-old with five wins in a field of five five-year-olds making his fifth grass start in the silks of trainer number five. Has won two races in six starts since The Sidley Stud claimed him for $8.000 but has not made much of a mark in three stakes efforts. Moves into CA Bred company for the first time in twenty-five starts. His last win was at this distance but not on the grass.
5. Freaky Obra Party (The Sidley Stud/V. Espinoza) The second entry from The Sidley Stud makes his stakes debut in his twenty-first start. It is also the first start for a new trainer who picked him up for $5.170 in the December auction. He has hit the board fourteen times in nineteen turf races so this might be the perfect spot for him to test the stakes waters. He gets a small CA Bred restricted field on a surface he likes and is working well.
Only five horses to choose from but with no real standout and layoffs and changes of connections the waters are muddy. In this case you kind of have to guess and go with your gut and I think the layoff along with the recent works point to Virtual Handyman being ready to fire. Similarly, on the outside I think Freaky Obra Party might be a sneaky contender, so I’ll tip him as the runner up with G2 winner Extreme Super Hero on the inside for third.
Categories: STAKES ARTICLES, Ungraded