Breeders Stakes ($500.000 Purse)
WO- For Three Year Olds Foaled in Canada
One Mile and One Half on the Turf
August 21, 2016

Three year old Canadians have a chance to showcase their talent in the 10th running of the Breeders Stakes, a race that carries a nice $500.000 purse along with it.  Those three year olds will need to be ready to run, because it’s a lengthy twelve furlong event on the turf that has been won by the likes of Stealth Fighter and Turon Warrior in the past.  Canadian Racing, who won with the latter in 2014, is the only trainer to win this race more then once, and we can always count on him to bring a strong runner to one of these races.  We’re lacking the star power in this year’s race, but a couple of these have been hot of late and can certainly make this race that catapults them into bigger things.   It’s a field of seven, and here they are!

#1- Game Time (Kopites, ridden by T C Baze)- On the fourth of July, Game Time stepped up and ran a beauty of a race, the best of his career to date in the $100.000 Manila Stakes at BEL, and finished third.  Just two races prior to that, he was breaking his maiden in a free race.  The Manila represented the former trainer, D J C Racing Stables, taking a shot, and he got a result.  Instead of bringing him another step forward, the trainer opted to sell him in private sales for $50.000 to Kopites, and with this placement the new trainer is clearly not messing around.  He is definitely one to watch here.

#2- Sunny Gabe (Mb Stables, ridden by M E Smith)- This autogen is a winner of three of his last four races since being purchased by Mb Stables in private sales from LionKing Stables for $200.000.  His first race with his new trainer was a true gem, and led to his higher placement in the Grade 3 Miami Mile, and he would pick up the big win.    Most recently, he was dropped down into an optional claiming race at PRX, and won the race with the king of the virtual turf, F Pennington, aboard.   Sunny Gabe is ready to roll, as he worked in stunning fashion on Wednesday down at MTH in preparation for this race.  It should at least be mentioned, though, that in his wins, he has been carrying quite a bit less weight then he will have here.

#3- Julius Caesar (Hay Makers Inc, ridden by J R Velazquez)- The Daiwa Major gelding comes into this race off a $30.000 claimer right here at WO in a mid-June sprint.  Prior to that, he was a well-beaten 7th in claiming company down at GP.  Therein lies the story with Julius Caesar, as the biggest backstabber to his career has been brutal inconsistency.  Ok, maybe it hasn’t been quite that bad, but I couldn’t resist.   The biggest question I have about him is whether or not he really wants to run this distance.  There isn’t enough public works at a mile on firm turn for to get a good feel and his past performances show that it can go either way.

#4- Little Phooey (Night Rider Stables, ridden by S X Bridgmohan)- Broke his maiden in October of last year, and has not been back to the winner’s circle since then.  Night Rider Stables tried to get him an allowance win a couple times in Florida, and after that didn’t pan out, he has regular been competing against other ON-breds on this race track.  Only once has he hit the board in those three races.  The trainer is banking on the extra distance being the difference maker here, and it may just be the answer that Little Phooey has been wanting.  Still, it’s tough to put a horse on top here that has been otherwise struggling a bit coming in.

#5- Scott The Great (Night Mare Racing, ridden by L Contreras)- I had the pleasure of watching Scott The Great run in his last race, the Prince Of Wales at FE last month.  An impression that I was left with in that race was that his start cost him the win.  He was the best horse in the stretch that day, and still almost won the race.  That runner up finish capped a three race stretch where he was in the top three in three top Canadian races, which also included the Queens Plate, so I’m not worried about the distance.  If this race was on the dirt, he’d seem like an automatic in here, but we’re running on the grass in this race.  He’s done it twice before, and the results are essentially one good, one bad.  Looking at works, I’m just not sure if this is his ideal surface, but the question here only needs to be whether he can beat the six rivals in which he is facing.  Bet accordingly to how you feel on that.  I think he can still get it done.

#6- Plucky Elmo (Hawaiian Shirt Guy, ridden by F Pennington)- I feel like I just wrote a preview involving this horse.  Oh yeah, because I did.  Plucky Elmo is right back on the race track after finishing second two weeks ago in the Wonder Where.  That’s a 1 1/4 mile turf event right here at WO for half the purse that we see today. That race was his turf debut, but unlike Scott The Great, there were some clear signs that he was ready to roll on the grass.  Now, we ask if he is ready to run twelve furlongs just two weeks after running ten.  We see this happen, and often see a horse still have success with a short rest period, and the question is usually how they recover going into the next one.

#7- Break The Deal (Canadian Racing, ridden by J S McAleney)- The Plucky Dogma colt makes a big step up for his trainer here, but you have to think that Canadian had several he could choose from and with him being the choice speaks volumes about the confidence that he has.  In his last race, he did run this exact distance down at ELP, but that might really be the best thing we can say about that race. If the trainer knows what happened there and how it can be fixed, then we can make that a throw out, but I am concerned about that race actually showing this distance is a little too much.  A little fine tuning, though, is all it will take, and he’s going right back out there and that’s a huge vote of confidence.

Prediction: 5-2-6-3

— NS

Categories: STAKES ARTICLES, Ungraded