The pressure attendant to an undefeated record is off after Saturday’s Tampa Bay Derby but War Pass must now answer an entirely different set of questions in advance of the Kentucky Derby. War Pass’ race was simply too bad to be true but does little to move the defending divisional champion forward toward the nine-furlong Wood Memorial next month at Aqueduct.
Unsettled before the start and slammed between horses at the break, Was Pass was rushed into contention behind a fast early pace, raced wide on the backstretch, was roused again near the half-mile mark after having chased a pace that none of those in contention at that point survived and was empty in the stretch while the Barclay Tagg-trained, New York-bred Big Truck ran down the Todd Pletcher delegate, Atoned, in the closing strides – very strong efforts by the first two, but a disaster for War Pass, who for the first time in six races found the pace in control of another. It was a nightmare trip and rider Cornelio Velasquez was of no help, but a race during which War Pass, a dominant frontrunner who has in the past been capable of setting fast fractions without fading late, showed no real interest once control of the pace was out of his hands.
"You saw what happened (at the break)," trainer Nick Zito said. "But he got moving and I thought he was in a good position going down the back, but when [Velasquez] asked him, nothing happened. I don't know what happened. I just don't know."
While Zito attempts to sort through the post-Tampa rubble and regroups, Big Truck and Atoned both asserted themselves in the Derby frame, thickening an increasingly intriguing plot.
Big Truck was fifth beneath Eibar Coa as Atoned launched a six-wide move while running six furlongs in 1:11.50. Atoned struck the lead a sixteenth-mile out with Big Truck in pursuit, and those two decided the issue in the last 40 yards, hitting the wire in 1:44.25.
The weekend’s races have resulted in a shuffle of the ranking and most assuredly not the last.
Pyro
Big Truck
Court Vision
War Pass
Cool Coal Man
Visionaire
Atoned
Dennis of Cork
Fierce Wind
Big Brown
Sierra Sunset
Colonel John
El Gato Malo
Sunday, March 16, 2008
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1 comments:
Can you please address what there is to like about Court Vision? His figures are slow, and he wasn't in the same zip code as the top two in the Fountain of Youth.
I can't decide what would present a juicier underlay on this horse: All the hype on him going into the Wood and betting against him there, or if he should manage to actually do well in that race and go to the Derby as one of the favorites and then completely tossing him.
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