Sadler Says Holy Candy Doing Well
Craig Stables and Donkey Island LLC’s favored Holy Candy, pulled up past the finish line as the favorite in the second division of the Oceanside, was being given a routine bath outside trainer John Sadler’s barn this morning.
“He’ll be OK,” Sadler said. “We’re going to do some diagnostics, some testing, X-rays and stuff like that. We don’t have a complete diagnosis yet, but we’ll have that in a couple of days. We did X-ray him last night and everything was clean.”
Without a full diagnosis, Sadler declined to speculate on the specifics of the injury to the gray son of Candy Ride, but said the general area could be in the “high suspensory” ligament area of the left foreleg.
“The good news is he’s going to be fine. He’ll be given some time off. How much is yet to be determined.”
The high point of the day for Sadler was a 1-2 finish by his trainees Ballard Ruler and Life a Riley in the fifth race, a 5-furlong sprint for California-bred 2-year-olds. It was the first race for both colts.
“They were both trained 10 minutes inland from here at Rancho Paseana by Cliff Sise,” Sadler said. “They went from Paseana to Hollywood Park together, trained up there together, came down here together and then ran together.
“And they look alike. So that was fun.”
Ballard Ruler, a son of Tribal Rule, is owned by Herman Sarkowsky. Life a Riley is a son of Bertrando and a homebred for Marty and Pam Wygod of Rancho Santa Fe.