UAE Derby fair odds: Six Speed intrigues on stretch-out
Any one of the top three choices in the Group 2 UAE Derby on Saturday at Meydan could go on to be the best horse out of the race. But when it comes to assessing their chances going 1 3/16 miles on Dubai World Cup night and possibly 1 1/4 miles five weeks later in the Kentucky Derby, there is only one horse who excites me.
Six Speed was scintillating in his UAE 2,000 Guineas (G3) win, but that was at a mile and nine weeks ago. Now the Kentucky-bred son of Not This Time is stretching out to 1 3/16 miles, but he feels like more of a known commodity than 5-2 morning-line favorite Pyromancer or 4-1 morning-line third choice Salloom. At the morning line prices, Six Speed is unquestionably the play for me.
Pyromancer is undefeated in three career starts in his native Japan, but those all came as a 2-year-old and he enters this contest off a three-month layoff. He went nine furlongs in his first two career races before cutting back to a mile to close out his juvenile season. Mixed signals for me entering a race where he hooked two really good Bhupat Seemar trainees.
Seemar trains both Six Speed and Salloom, who won his career debut the week after Six Speed won the Guineas. What does not appear in the past performances is that Salloom scratched at the gate of the Road to the Kentucky Derby Stakes in what would have been his second career start.
Again, talent wise, I am not going to say Six Speed is the best of this group. But from a setup standpoint into a tough race, he just feels like the obvious play given the challenges his stablemate has had.
Long-shot-wise, Rammaas is interesting at 40-1 morning line considering my fair odds are much less. He began his career with trainer Antonio Sano before breeder Sheikh Rashid Bin Humaid Al Nuaimi's RRR Racing moved the Speightstown colt to Seemar in the Middle East. Rammaas was no match for stablemate Six Speed in the Guineas, but he appeared to take a step forward March 8 in a race at Jebel Ali while carrying 128 pounds.