The Audubon ($225.000 Purse)
CD- For Three Year Olds
One Mile and One Eighth on the Turf
June 3, 2023
The racing will go on this weekend, but before I get into my first preview for the weekend, I want to say thank you to Mike La Rosa for giving me the opportunity to write for the SRF and for everything else he did for me and for the game. It is something that cannot be said enough, and I will forever be grateful for it. We will celebrate his legacy on Thursday, as well as the 20th anniversary of the game, and those two things certainly go hand in hand. Thank you, Mike.
Well, it’s hard to move on from that to the intentions of this article, but the stake coverage will move on to Saturday’s running of The Audubon from CD. This is a relatively new race on the calendar, debuting in 2020 and still carrying an ungraded designation. It’s purse of $225.000 is certainly graded caliber, and it is the highest offering by this nine-furlong turf race since it began. SRF writers won the first two editions of the race, as Financial Peace and the late Stylishly Ugly took the first two, and then it was someone who gets their wins talked about a lot here scoring the victory in 2022 as Keeper Of Time won for Smokey Stover. He would go on to have a good summer and fall, and ran in the BC Turf at KEE, and while his finishes have not been poor since, the class of races he has been has declined. He was recently claimed by Angelos Stable, and on honestly, it two-year-old not surprise me if this horse becomes resurgent into this level again. There are seven going to post for this year’s event, and while I don’t think we have a standout or big favorite here, there are some interesting horses in this field. Let’s take a look at them now!
#1- Watership Down (Lazy Eye, ridden by G Corrales)- A lightly raced third quarter two-year-old that will be running against winners for the first time. After not getting it done in his first two races on the main track and a couple months to think about it, Watership Down was moved to the grass at GG and would also run long for the first time. Lazy Eye would get what he wanted as his horse scored a good looking two length win. Now, the trainer gets a good measuring stick for his horse to see how he can handle this field, and I don’t think it’s impossible for him to pull it off.
#2- Five Shot Party (Maxmillion Farm, ridden by D Cohen)- This is another one that has not raced a lot yet, but he also has not won at all, either. There was nothing special about his first two races, and after being sold in private sales last July to Maxmillion Farm, he would sit on the farm for ten months before he was back out there. I always find that level of patience by a trainer to be truly admirable, and it is clearly why Maxmillion is one of the best trainers in the game. When Five Shot Party did return, it was against CA-breds, going a mile on the turf, neither of which he had done before. He was third, with nothing standing out about the race, but maybe he just needed the start. I’m not going to be picking him, but it will certainly be interesting to watch how he does.
#3- Details Matter (Alydar Stables, ridden by L Saez)- This colt has certainly been hit and miss over his career, either winning or being nowhere to be found. But since details matter, if you look between the lines of that, you can see that he is three-for-three on the grass, and 1-for-4 on the dirt, with the three non-wins being by a combined twenty lengths. The turf works for Details Matter are outstanding, and while the trainer was hoping for a TC bid, I would imagine that we’re going to see this one on the grass for a while now. His most recent start saw him be victorious in the $100.000 Singletary Stakes at SA, and I see no reason why he can’t build on that here.
#4- Nevada Lee (Nakamura Stables, ridden by J Loveberry)- There was every reason to be excited about this horse as he finished off his two-year-old season, scoring a pair of wins that included that $100.000 Logan Stakes. But then, the trainer was lured to the main track for his horse and the TC chase, and to put it nicely, those races did not go well. Unfortunately, his return to the grass in the Grade 2 American Turf also went poorly. I don’t think we should give up on this one yet, but he definitely needs to get some positive momentum going.
#5- Regulatory (Mb Stables, ridden by A Beschizza)- Possibly, this is a case of a horse that has been a little slow to get going, but eventually to have success in this barn, you are going to have to start showing results. He was fine as a two-year-old, not doing anything to stand out, but not embarrassing himself, either. Something different needed to happen, and in February, Mb changed up the type of races he was doing to running turf routes. Improvement has been shown, getting an allowance win and also running second last month, being edged out in a photo by Details Matter. The rematch between the two of them should be good, and Regulatory will be a contender.
#6- Sinning Black (Night Mare Racing, ridden by F Geroux)- The Sinissippi Rubicon gelding was victorious in his second career start, and that sent him into the TC preps. Of the horses in this field that also tried out that path, Sinning Black had the best results, running fourth in the Jerome and second in the TAM Derby. In April, he appeared in the BG Stakes, needing to get points to make it into the TC, and came up very empty. That result certainly demoralized the trainer about him, and it has been back to the farm since. He’ll run on the grass for the first time here and had an encouraging work here two weeks ago. I may regret not picking him.
#7- Island Boy (Arindel, ridden by T Gaffalione)- This is the only horse in the field that has been racing on the turf throughout his career. Other than his April debut, he’s been on the turf in every start, and he has run decently. However, I wish I could say a little more than that, because he doesn’t have any wins other than that debut, but he’s been the runner up three times, which were all at the stake level (two being FL-bred races). That didn’t turn me off, it was his last start that did. He would go to PRX for an allowance, probably for a confidence builder, and ran dead last, tenth of ten. If he’s here off of that, obviously Arindel feels that is a throw out, so I will take that approach with him, too. But I can’t put him on top.
Prediction: 3-5-1-7
— NS
Categories: STAKES ARTICLES, Ungraded
