Wasted Tears No Problem for Lilbourne Eliza

Miller Racing LLC’s Lilbourne Eliza (IRE) scored the upset in Saturday’s $90,000 Wasted Tears, holding off a fast-closing Angelica Zapata to claim the first stakes win of her career.

Named after the Bart Evans homebred who won six graded stakes on grass, including Gulfstream’s Honey Fox Stakes (G3) in 2010, the Wasted Tears was also the filly’s first win since being claimed in California by Miller Racing and sent to trainer Marty Wolfson earlier this summer. In her first two races for Wolfson, Lilbourne Eliza was unplaced in both the $90,000 Anka Germana stakes in May and the $75,000 Soaring Softly stakes in August, both at Gulfstream

“She’s very good looking,” Wolfson explained when asked what first drew him to the filly. “She was running for $30,000 or $40,000, so she was eligible for starter (allowances), too. That’s what we were looking at.”

Sent off at 35-1, Lilbourne Eliza surprised the betting public with her win, but she may have equally surprised her connections.

“We had three horses in the race,” Rob Miller of Miller Racing explained. “We thought she’d be third of our three horses.”

Instead, Lilbourne Eliza topped the entire field of 12 accomplished female turf runners. The group not only included Angelica Zapata, who entered the Wasted Tears off back-to-back stakes victories, but also Lilbourne Eliza’s stablemate E B Ryder, winner of the Anka Germana. The 4-year-old daughter of Elusive City and the Marju (IRE) mare Midnight Partner (IRE) did so by sitting off the moderate pace set by the front-running Burning Truth before making a bid between horses at the top of the stretch and striding out to the finish. Under jockey Fernando Jara, her margin of victory was a half-length.

“She had a really good trip,” Jara said. “We sat behind the speed. We started to make our way through and I was just waiting for room to open up. When it did, she had a really good kick.”

Wolfson credits the win with a decision he made to make an equipment change with his filly. In the Wasted Tears, Lilbourne Eliza ran without blinkers for the first time since last December.

“I think it really worked,” Wolfson said. “She was so speed crazy when they claimed her out of California, and her works – I never have blinkers on her when she works – have been excellent. She trains great without blinkers, so I decided, ‘What the heck, I‘ll take them off in this race,’ and she really relaxed good.

“I worked her the other day, and she went (four furlongs) in 48 (seconds), and it was like she was galloping,” he added. “Her works are like that all the time, but when I first got her, I looked at her form and she had a couple decent races with blinkers. I usually take them off right away, but I wanted to see how she was, and she was way too wired. So I just waited it out, and it worked out.”

Wolfson also praised Jara for his skillful riding. Although his instructions were to send Lilbourne Eliza to the front, Wolfson was pleased that his rider had the mindset to realize his filly was running comfortably mid-pack and wait to challenge the leader.

“I had a boy on her that’s smart enough to know if a horse is relaxed when they’re running,” Wolfson said. “I told (Jara) I wanted her on the lead, and he had enough sense to know she was very relaxed where she was. That’s why Jara wins the Belmont and he’s such a great rider.”

Lilbourne Eliza paid a healthy $79.60 to win. Angelica Zapata, the heavy favorite, paid $3.40 to place, and pacesetter Burning Truth ($16.60) finished another half-length back in third.