Valedictory Stakes (Grade 3)- $125.000 Purse
WO- For Three Year Olds and Upward
One Mile and One Half on the Dirt
December 13, 2020

North of the border on Sunday, we will have the 11th running of the Grade 3 Valedictory Stakes. It will run for its traditional $125.000 purse, so it is a smaller event that could possibly springboard horses into bigger and better things. However, for 2019 winner Kaunakakai, it brings him right back here once again as he will try to repeat as the race’s champion for The Sidley Stud. The trainer also won the race in 2016 with Techfluence. Let’s take a look to meet our field of eight!

#1- No More Haggis (YME Stable, ridden by E J Wilson)- The Ginger Haggis colt has won two of his nine career races, but has recently taken a liking to finishing second. After winning an allowance, he has been the runner up three times in a row, with all of them good efforts at good tracks. He was graduated up into the ungraded ranks for the $150.000 Bryan Station at KEE and nearly pulled off the win, finishing second in a dead heat. If more ground will get him what it takes to get another win, then he certainly gets that here.

#2- Hurricane Run (Fractious, ridden by K Kimura)- This gelding was picked up via a $40.000 claim from Fractious in his last start, a nine furlong race that he won at KEE on just 12 days of rest. Since then, he has had close to two full months to recover from those back to back races and to allow his new trainer a chance to see what he really had. He must have liked what he saw, as he’ll stretch out to the max distance and run graded for the first time. There is one ungraded try from SAR in July.

#3- Chrystal Chrystal (Maxmillion Farm, ridden by R M Hernandez)- For the most part, this gelding has raced on the grass over his ten race career, and he picked up two wins over that time. The second win was particularly noteworthy, since it came while running twelve furlongs, which was at SAR. Off of that race, he would switch to the main track and make his stake debut in the Grade 3 Premiers at KEE, an 11-furlong race where he was third of five. It’s been a couple months, so with some likely fine-tuning, the trainer hopes for a better result here.

#4- Class Factor (Nakamura Stables, ridden by S Ryan)- The last time we saw Class Factor out on the track, he was the other horse in that second place dead heat at KEE in the Bryan Station. He has had a little more stake experience during his career, and was involved in another dead heat, this a fourth place split in the Grade3 OK Derby. Before that, another dead heat. That time for third. Back in March, he would dead heat for a win in an allowance. Only in HRP. Here, he will stretch out to the max for the first time and I think it will be good for him.

#5- Popular Decision (Axeman, ridden by J Stein)- After a couple of fourth place finishes at the stake level, prior trainer TIratzo lost confidence in the gelding and placed him into a $40.000 claimer. Axeman was able to pick him up, and put him back into stakes. He has not seen a win from him yet in either of the two starts, but he did run third in the Grade 3 Tokyo City Cup, a similar race to this in that it is also run at twelve furlongs. His last race was not as good, so it is still uncertain if he can win at this level.

#6- Psychotic Ruler (Night Rider Stables, ridden by S R Bahen)- This gelding was commonly written about in the SRF during 2017 and 2018, when he ran in the BC Juvenile, and then in some KYD preps. He was competitive, but never able to get another win to continue to race at the higher levels. He passed through a few barns, and struck a low point in a $7.500 claimer in June. It was there that Night Rider picked him up, put him back on the dirt, and two months later, was winning the Birdstone with him. He hasn’t followed that up well, but the conditions here are better for him than the Woodward was.

#7- Kaunakaki (The Sidley Stud, ridden by P Husbands)- The winner of the 2019 Valedictory would love to duplicate his achievement here. Since he won the race, Kaunakaki has picked up two more wins, each an open allowance but neither against great company. Those wins came at FE and HAW, so he was ducking better horses there. Right after the win, he tried more graded races, and they did not go well for him, nor did the $50.000 Bulldog Handicap at FNO in October. Sometimes, going back to the scene of victory can rejuvenate a horse, so don’t rule him out.

#8- Sunpunch (John Henry, ridden by L Contreras)- The veteran five year old gelding by Cherokee Sunset will make the 29th start of his career. Over that period of time, he has made a handful of graded appearances, and did win one of them in 2019, the AP Handicap. That would end up being his final race for prior trainer Greeko Holdem, who sold him to John Henry eighteen days later for $100.000. He’s run well in his new silks, and is currently riding a two race winning streak. Almost all of his recent races are on the grass, but one that was not was the Tokyo City Cup, where he was second. I like him here.

Prediction: 8-4-1-7

— NS

Categories: Grade III, STAKES ARTICLES