June, 2022 | Horse Racing Free Tips

Kentucky Oaks Starters Shahama, Venti Valentine Regroup In Saturday’s Mother Goose

Shahama and Venti Valentine, a respective sixth and 14th in the Grade 1 Kentucky Oaks, will do battle in Saturday's Grade 2, $250,000 Mother Goose for 3-year-old fillies going 1 1/16 miles at Belmont Park.

Seven of the past 15 editions of the Mother Goose were won by a filly who also raced in that year's Kentucky Oaks, including Rachel Alexandra [2009] and Untapable [2014] who both captured the Kentucky Oaks-Mother Goose double. This year will see two Kentucky Oaks entrants square off in another important race in the 3-year-old filly division.

KHK Racing's Shahama will attempt to make Todd Pletcher the standalone winningest trainer in the Mother Goose with seven wins. He is currently on even terms with fellow Hall of Famer D. Wayne Lukas.

The bay daughter of Munnings, and half-sister to dual Eclipse Award-winner Lookin At Lucky, endured a troubled trip in the Kentucky Oaks. She was placed toward the rear of the 14-horse field in the four path around the first turn and was bumped around the five-sixteenths pole, but displayed a late rally to finish 5 1/2 lengths behind the victorious Secret Oath.

Shahama was unbeaten in four starts in the United Arab Emirates, where she was campaigned by Fawzi Nass, capturing the Group 3 UAE Oaks in February at Meydan Racecourse before arriving at Pletcher's South Florida division the following month.

Pletcher said Shahama exuded talent based off how she trained amongst his other quality sophomore fillies, including multiple graded stakes placed Goddess of Fire, who ran 11th in the Kentucky Oaks.

“It was hard to gauge her racing form. The one thing we felt pretty good about was the way she had trained in company with some of our other horses,” said Pletcher, whose Mother Goose winners include Jersey Girl [1998], Octave [2007], Devil May Care [2010], Buster's Ready [2011], Off the Tracks [2016] and Zaajel [2021]. “To me, she's proven she belongs in races like that, and I thought her Oaks was maybe a better race than it looks on paper. She was still closing at the end. She drew an outside post and it took her a little while to get on track. I thought it was a solid effort.”

Flavien Prat will return to the irons aboard Shahama from post 1.

New York-bred Venti Valentine will be in search of her first graded stakes triumph for trainer Jorge Abreu.

Owned by NY Final Furlong Racing Stable and Parkland Thoroughbreds, the Firing Line filly displayed her usual close-to-the-pace tactics in the Oaks rating in third behind a fast pace. After checking several times around the far turn, Venti Valentine had nothing to offer in the stretch run, finishing last-of-14.

Never worse than second in her five starts prior to the Oaks, Venti Valentine has won both of her starts over Big Sandy, capturing her career debut over four next-out winners in September before defeating her Empire State-bred counterparts in the Maid of the Mist the following month at Belmont.

A close second to eventual Grade 1-winner and Oaks-runner-up Nest in the Grade 2 Demoiselle in December at Aqueduct, she made her 2022 debut a victorious one with a seven-length romp in the open-company Busher Invitational before finishing a close second in the Grade 3 Gazelle in April at the Big A.

“She came out of the Oaks in good shape,” Abreu said. “I'm going to cross a line through that race and just regroup with her She's been doing everything well here. I think one turn will suit her better, not that she can't go two turns because she proved she can go two turns. But I think the mile and a sixteenth and cutting back in distance will be better for her.”

Jose Ortiz, in pursuit of a third Mother Goose win, will pilot Venti Valentine from post 2.

Trainer Brad Cox will send out Grade 1-winner Juju's Map, who arrives off a commanding gate-to-wire performance in a 1 1/16-mile allowance optional claimer on the Kentucky Oaks undercard at Churchill Downs, earning an 87 Beyer Speed Figure.

The Albaugh Family Stables-owned dark bay daughter of Liam's Map has never finished worse than second in five starts, including a 4 1/4-length coup in the Grade 1 Alcibiades at Keeneland en route to a runner-up placing to Champion 2-Year-Old Filly Echo Zulu in the Grade 1 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies at Del Mar.

Florent Geroux, the pilot in all five starts, retains the mount from post 5.

Klaravich Stables' Gerrymander will attempt to make amends following a troubled sixth in the Grade 2 Eight Belles on May 6 at Churchill Downs in her 2022 debut.

Gerrymander, by Into Mischief, was a distant second to Echo Zulu in last year's Grade 1 Frizette at Belmont en route to a score in the Tempted on November 5 over the same surface in the final start of her juvenile season. Gerrymander is trained by four-time Eclipse Award-winner Chad Brown, who won the 2019 Mother Goose with Dunbar Road.

Joel Rosario will ride Gerrymander from post 4.

Completing the field is the John Terranova-trained Midnight Stroll, who was a troubled ninth in the Grade 2 Black-Eyed Susan last out on May 20 at Pimlico Race Course. The two-time winning daughter of leading third crop sire Not This Time checked heavily into the first turn and lost position, finishing 13 3/4 lengths behind the victorious Interstatedaydream.

Hall of Famer Javier Castellano will ride from post 3.

Since its first running in 1957, the Mother Goose has been won by a dozen Hall of Fame fillies, 11 of which sealed up championship honors in their respective years of victory, including Cicada [1962], Dark Mirage [1968], Chris Evert [1974], Ruffian [1975], Davona Dale [1979], Mom's Command [1985], Open Mind [1989], Go for Wand [1990], Serena's Song [1995] and Rachel Alexandra. The historic test for 3-year-old fillies is named in honor of H.P. Whitney's winner of the 1924 Futurity against colts.

The Mother Goose is carded as Race 8 on Saturday's 10-race program, which has a first post of 1 p.m. Eastern.

America's Day at the Races will present daily coverage and analysis of the spring/summer meet at Belmont Park on the networks of FOX Sports. For the complete broadcast schedule, visit https://www.nyra.com/belmont/racing/tv-schedule.

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Wearable Technology Helps New York Identify ‘At Risk’ Horses In Prospective Study

The 10th Welfare and Safety of the Racehorse Summit – conducted on Wednesday, June 22, at Keeneland in Lexington, Ky. – included a presentation on “Equine Wearable Technology,” which moderator Joe Appelbaum of the New York Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association likened to the popular Fitbit devices seeing widespread use in the fitness and health technology realms.

During the presentation, Dr. Scott Palmer, the equine medical director of the New York State Gaming Commission, discussed the results of a prospective study utilizing this technology over the past year at New York Racing Association tracks.

Beginning last summer at Saratoga, every horse in one race per day was fitted with a StrideSafe device in its saddle cloth. The technology measures acceleration in three dimensions, including concussive forces on both the front and the hind limbs. Each horse, Palmer explained, has a different pattern or “fingerprint” at high speeds that would be described as normal; the data becomes most useful when it can be compared to both a horse's normal pattern as well as a standard of horses racing across the same surface.

Palmer explained that significant deviations from the mean are a caution sign to indicate that a horse has modified its stride. Those “red alert” signs have then been used to initiate a discussion with a trainer and suggest additional diagnostics; Palmer said the data is able to demonstrate issues that “trainers can't see, that jockeys can't feel, that's not obvious at all.”

That prospective study at Saratoga created 131 data collections, of which 15 were found to be “red alert” horses and 25 “yellow alert” (based on different standard deviations from the mean). The rest were considered “green,” or with data points within a single standard deviation from the mean.

Only 40 percent of those “red alert” horses raced again in the next four months, whereas 78 percent of the “green” horses returned to race in the next four months.

Continuing with every horse in every race through the Belmont Fall and Aqueduct Winter meets, the data collected was paired with artificial intelligence to continue improving the database. The project now includes 6,500 recordings of over 2,500 horses.

Palmer said the technology can “reliably detect subtle gait abnormalities, which is a way to detect lameness in the early stages and provide for more timely intervention than is currently possible.”

In one specific instance, a horse raced five times wearing the StrideSafe device, but in its fifth race, a major deviation occurred around the 50 to 55-second mark of the race. When Palmer collected the data and presented it to the trainer the next morning, he learned that the horse had walked off the track sound, but cooled out lame, and was later discovered to have a knee fracture.

“All of the success we've had so far (in terms of reducing the equine fatality rate) has been based upon subjective data gathered by veterinarians examining horses,” Palmer said. “I think we are bottomed out pretty well in our ability to do that. I think that we really need to use advanced technology to take another step forward to help us identify these horses that are at risk of injury.

“Right now I can say that I want a sensor on every horse… I think our fatality rates will drop way down, and I think our attrition rates will go way down.”

What the data does not do, Palmer cautioned, is tell a trainer or veterinarian where the soundness issue may be coming from. He stressed that the conversation with a trainer not become adversarial, but instead be focused on education and prevention.

Palmer explained: “You have to tell the trainer, 'Your horse had a red-alert performance. This is what that means. This is what that doesn't mean. And this is what you need to do about it.' Because that's actionable intelligence, right now.”

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Mychel Sanchez, Suspended for Betting Against His Mounts, Returns at Delaware Park

Nearly five months after beginning a suspension for betting against his own mounts, jockey Mychel Sanchez returned to action Wednesday, riding in the second race at Delaware Park. Sanchez finished eighth aboard XY Lady (Sharp Azteca) in the race for 2-year-old maiden fillies. He is also listed on mounts on the Thursday, Friday and Saturday cards at Delaware.

Sanchez last rode Jan. 19 at Parx. Shortly after that, the Pennsylvania Racing Commission handed him a 60-day suspension after it was discovered that during a betting spree he made wagers on horses other than his own mounts on races at Parx and at Laurel. The Maryland Racing Commission also suspended Sanchez for 60 days, with the days running concurrently with the Pennsylvania suspension.

When the suspensions ended in March, Sanchez apparently had a difficult time finding a track that would allow him to ride. At the time, attorney Alan Pincus confirmed to the TDN that Parx officials would not accept entries where Sanchez was listed to ride. 1/ST Racing, which operates Laurel and Pimlico, announced that Sanchez had been banned indefinitely.

Sanchez's name first reappeared in the entries when he was listed on horses for the June 10 card at Delaware, but he was replaced on each of those mounts.

Calls and emails made Wednesday to Delaware Racing Commission Executive Director Sarah Crane went unanswered. Pincus did not return a phone call seeking to clarify Sanchez's status.

While admitting that his client had bet against himself, Pincus said that Sanchez had done so as an outlet to battle depression. He said that Sanchez, in all cases, tried to win, even when he had bet on another horse.

“It was clear he was giving his best effort,” Pincus said. “He was not fixing races. He won several of the races in which he bet against his horses. The horse paid $37 in one race, $27 in another. He was just doing something crazy that only a psychiatrist can explain.”

The TDN, through a Freedom of Information Law request, acquired the records of Sanchez's betting activity that were reviewed by the Pennsylvania Racing Commission. The betting log covers the period of Dec. 23 of last year through Jan. 3, during which time Sanchez placed 104 bets on his TVG account. From those 104, there were only six races in which he made significant bets against himself. Whether he was involved in a race or not, he was betting heavily. In one instance, he made a $2,000 win, place and show bet on a race at Laurel, betting on his mount, Johnny Sack (Mosler). He lost all $6,000 as Johnny Sack finished sixth.