SA Sprint Championship Coming Together
Save for the margin of a scant nose, there could be three Breeders’ Cup winners running in next Saturday’s Grade I, $300,000, “Win and You’re In” Santa Anita Sprint Championship for 3-year-olds and up at six furlongs.
They would be Goldencents, last year’s Dirt Mile winner; Secret Circle, last year’s Sprint winner; and Merit Man, who missed by a nose of winning the defunct Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Sprint in 2012.
Playing it as straight as Princess Kate’s teeth, trainer Bob Hess Jr. said he plans to enter Merit Man in Saturday’s race, marking the Florida-bred son of With Distinction’s first start since winning the five-furlong Green Flash at Del Mar Aug. 13.
“Merit Man is by no means a good work horse, but he’s working well for Kent (Desormeaux, who has ridden the bay colt in his last four starts),” said Hess, who has enjoyed remarkable success with the 44-year-old Hall of Fame jockey dating back to the 1990s.
“Merit Man worked today (five furlongs in 59.40). He went well and we’re set for the race. I want to see if he’s good enough to compete in the Breeders’ Cup. We’ll learn that on Saturday.”
Hess and Desormeaux were virtually unbeatable together at the recent Del Mar meet. “Kent won on 14 of the 15 races we won there,” Hess said. “Victor (Espinoza) won one for us. I pretty much only rode Kent.
“There’s always been kind of a natural respect and a bit of chemistry. It doesn’t always work out, but it worked out at Del Mar. I think we can keep this going—not to that level, necessarily, but we can keep it going and be consistent throughout the rest of the year.”
Irish-bred Rich Tapestry landed at LAX yesterday for the Santa Anita Sprint Championship. The 6-year-old Holy Roman gelding trained by Michael Chang has not raced since April 27 when he was eighth by five lengths at Sha Tin in Hong Kong.
Winner of six of 26 starts, Rich Tapestry will be stabled at trainer Leonard Powell’s barn at Santa Anita, then return overseas after Saturday’s race for the Hong Kong International Sprint in December, according to Cindy Niemetz, West Coast representative of the International racing Bureau Ltd.
Niemetz said Rich Tapestry is the first horse from Hong Kong ever to run in the U.S. Jockey Olivier Doleuze has the mount on Saturday.
Secret Circle worked five furlongs in a bullet 59 flat Sunday for Bob Baffert, fastest of 83 drills at the distance, the average time of which was 1:01.05.
Source: Santa Anita Park