Undrafted Perfect on Turf
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Photo:
Coglianese Photos
The combination of owners Ken and Sarah Ramsey, and their
primary trainer Mike Maker, has been a potent one at this year’s spring meet at
Churchill Downs. They have sent out low-priced favorite, after low-priced
favorite, all meet long, and have made bettors eat chalk, or all together avoid
betting a race in which they are involved. Today Wesley Ward and Wes Welker set
out to do what very few have managed to accomplish thus far this spring.
Namely, take down a heavily favored Ramsey horse. By post time, however, such a
feat was merely a pipe dream, for the day at least, as both Redwood Kitten and
Animal Style were scratched from the race.
The scratch of Worldventurer left the field with only four
runners, and with the Ramsey entries out of the picture, Undrafted was sent off
as the 3-5 favorite. At the break, Avare went out to take the lead with Mellow
Fellow in hot pursuit. Those two quickly put some distance between themselves
and a patient Undrafted and dueled through fractions of 23:94 for the opening
quarter and 46:86 for the half, quickening the tempo as they battled for the
lead. As the field straightened for home, a confident Dylan Davis pointed Undrafted
to the outside and the chestnut gelding took off like a shot up the center of
the track. Roaring past the tired leaders, he lengthened his advantage with
every stride to cruise under the wire clear by 10 lengths. He stopped the clock
in 1.35:06 for the mile long turf race.
As a son of Purim, it should come as no surprise that
Undrafted has an affinity for the grass. In his only prior start on the
surface, the gelding tracked the pace from second, took command in the turn,
and drew off to win by two lengths. Of course, despite his obvious preference
for the lawn, Undrafted as actually run quite well on the dirt, stringing
together 3 consecutive third place finishes in stakes races down at Gulfstream.
He also owns a win over synthetics despite the fact that his worst race, a 13th
in the Blue Grass, came over that particular surface, though I believe that day
the distance, not the surface, was the issue.
Undrafted’s dam French Jeannette was a sprinter, and Purim
never won beyond 8.5 furlongs. Despite his own distance limitations, Purim has
sired some routers, most notably Twilight Eclipse and Two Months Rent. Thus
far, Undrafted has shown that he prefers the shorter sprint distances. Though
it would be nice to see him in a major turf race like the G1 Secretariat at
Arlington this summer, at this point I believe Undrafted is more likely to fit
into the turf sprint niche. The Secretariat might not be a viable option, but
perhaps taking a shot at the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint might be. It’s obviously
a bit soon to tell, especially based off only two allowance wins, but with as
good as he looked today, I can’t help but speculate.
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