August Rain faces 11 rivals Saturday in British Columbia Derby

Canadian Derby (G3) winner August Rain and four others from that race are in the full field of a dozen 3-year-olds lining up Saturday for the Grade 3, US$92,098 British Columbia Derby at Hastings.

Eleven geldings and one colt were entered for the two-turn, 1 1/8-mile race on the dirt oval in Vancouver. The 77th British Columbia Derby will be the sixth of eight races Saturday. It is scheduled to start at 8:05 p.m. EDT.

Click here for Hastings entries and results.

Bred and owned by Peter Redekop, August Rain has won three of his last four starts, including the Ross McLeod Stakes and Chris Loseth Handicap. Both those races were at Hastings, where the Sungold gelding is 9: 5-1-2. Trained by Barbara Heads, August Rain has been favored in his last eight races, winning five times. Amadeo Pérez, who is closing in on his fifth Hastings jockey title in the last seven years, will ride from post 2.

Canadian Derby runner-up J Dutton, fourth-place Classy City, sixth-place Lord of Battle and 10th-place Skipper’s Pride also are entered for the B.C. Derby.

Stakes-winning frontrunner Tougherthantherest, who finished second in the 1 1/16-mile Muckleshoot Derby on Aug. 11 at Emerald Downs, makes his first start for trainer John Snow after being moved from trainer Blaine Wright.

Shock the House, Diocles and What’s Shakin, who finished second through fourth in that order in the 1 1/16-mile Canadian Thoroughbred Horse Society Sales Stakes, come back from that Aug. 26 race in the Hastings slop.

Maiden winners Westminster, Horatio and Moneyshot also are in the B.C. Derby field.

Saturday’s race ends the abbreviated Western Canadian Derby Series, which began Aug. 24 with August Rain’s 1 1/4-mile victory at Century Mile in Edmonton. The second annual series was supposed to include Bricklayer’s win Aug. 5 in the listed, 1 1/8-mile Manitoba Derby in Winnipeg, but that race was removed this summer when Assiniboia Downs was placed under a federal quarantine for equine infectious anemia. A US$73,676 bonus for sweeping the series was canceled, but an added US$18,419 will be awarded to the top three trainers and owners.