Claiming Game proves alive and well on Belmont’s Big Weekend
Two of the big winners on the day before the Belmont are claimers. Well not anymore, but as my father once said, “once a claimer, always a claimer.” He wasn’t trying to disparage horses that have risen out of the claiming ranks, but rather he was speaking of the fact that they had been, at least once in their career, available for purchase right there on race day. My father was well aware that sometimes these horses can become quite good. Horses in for a tag more often than not never become stakes winners, but sometimes they do, giving hope to everyone who has claimed, or dreams of someday claiming horses, of finding that one special rags to riches horse. Friday at Belmont Park was the perfect example of former claimers making it big.
The 3rd running of the 2-mile Belmont Gold Cup Invitational was a wonderfully fun race to watch, and in the end, it would be hard to argue that anyone but the best horse won. Da Big Hoss waited patiently for more than a mile and a half, before kicking it in under Florent Geroux. The move, even after that distance already traveled, was explosive. It also proved decisive.
The 1 ½-length win was the sixth in nine starts since the son of Lemon Drop Kid was claimed by Skychai Racing for $50,000 on June 21 of last year at Churchill Downs. The last five of those wins for trainer Mike Maker have come in stakes races. A claimer just 12 months ago, Da Big Hoss now looks to be a horse heading to a second straight shot in the Breeders’ Cup Turf later this fall at Santa Anita.
Just two races earlier, we saw another former claimer making good. Joking was not claimed as recently as Da Big Hoss, but his purchase price may turn out to be even a bigger bargain than the 50k spent on the Belmont Gold Cup winner. No spring chicken, the seven-year-old gelded son of Distorted Humor has never been better than he is right now. Owned by his trainer, Charlton Baker, Joking also kicked it into high gear this afternoon while cashing the biggest check of his career.
The only closer in a field of five, he was last for much of the way, but came flying down the center of the track to nail Dads Caps in the final few jumps of the Grade 2 True North. A culmination of steady improvement over the last few years, Joking won his third straight race, and earned his first graded stakes victory in his initial attempt. Victory in the $250,000 sprint was worth $137,500, and upped his 2016 total above a quarter-million; not bad for a horse claimed for a mere $20,000 in January of 2014.
So, while the wealthiest of the sport can spend millions to buy the horses that they hope will become major stakes winners, there is another way. Racing still offers the opportunity for the thriftier owner to come up with something very good. On the big stage of Belmont Stakes weekend, Da Big Hoss and Joking proved that today in impressive and exciting style.