If you believe in horse racing’s future in California, there is no better place to realize it than opening day at Santa Anita. The day after Christmas is filled with tradition, anticipation and hope. The only thing missing Thursday was snow on top of the San Gabriel mountains that provide one of the most picturesque settings in sports.
Oh, yeah, there was also racing. The marquee name was Kentucky Derby winner Mystik Dan, running in the Grade 1 $300,000 Malibu Stakes. He did not bring his “A” game after an almost 2,000-mile van ride from New Orleans, where he was spending the winter.
He broke well in the seven-furlong dirt contest but never seemed to get his footing and finished last in the six-horse race. Raging Torrent ($7.20), who has won four of seven races this year, rallied to win. Stronghold was second and Imagination was third.
Jockey Brian Hernandez Jr. said Mystik Dan “broke good, but it just seemed like we were always chasing. I think shortening up took away from him. After the mile and a quarter [in the Derby], it is tough to go back to seven-eighths. The horse is fine.”
Raging Torrent is owned by Mark Davis and Great Friends Stable, which is headed by Craig Dado, a former marketing executive at Del Mar. The colt was trained by Doug O’Neill and ridden by Frankie Dettori.
“The horse was doing so well and threw such a great pose,” O’Neill said. “We knew this is a perfect distance, so we were so optimistic. But in this sport, a lot of times you’re optimistic and you go home with a flat balloon.
“But he ran a race that we had dreamed of and just so happy and proud. We really thought going into it we were the best horse, the best distance. And just watching him day in, day out, he was training out of this world. So, yeah, he ran great.”
Mystik Dan was only the fifth horse to try to win the Derby-Malibu double. The first time it happened was in 1954 when Determine won both. In 1979, Spectacular Bid won both races as did Ferdinand in 1986. Silver Charm was the last horse to run both races in 1997 and finished second in the Malibu.
There were six graded stakes Thursday and one of the most consequential was jockey Flavien Prat winning the Grade 2 $200,000 Mathis Mile Stakes aboard King of Gosford ($3.40). It was his 56th graded stakes win this year, breaking the record of Hall of Famer Jerry Bailey, who won 55 in 2003.
“I’m very pleased,” Prat said. “There are a lot of people behind this. Me, my family, [agent] Mike and [trainer] Phil [D’Amato], have been great supporters of me. And [trainer] Mr. [Richard] Mandella, who was a great supporter when I first came here. I think there couldn’t be a better place to win it than here at Santa Anita. It is definitely worth all the work when something like this happens.”
The first stakes was the Grade 2 $200,000 Laffit Pincay Jr. Stakes, formerly known as the San Antonio for horses 3 and up going 1-1/16 miles on the dirt, and was won by J B Strikes Back in mostly a gate-to-wire performance.
It was somewhat of an upset as the 3-year-old gelding paid $34.80 for O’Neill and jockey Antonio Fresu. J B Strikes Back is owned by the Buss family and “J B” stands for Jerry Buss, former owner of the Lakers. The name of the stable? Purple Rein Racing.
In the Grade 2 $200,000 San Gabriel Stakes, heavy favorite Johannes ($2.60 to win) rallied down the stretch to comfortably win by 1¼ lengths. Trainer Tim Yakteen is hoping the win puts the 4-year-old Nyquist colt in contention for the Eclipse Award for Best Older Male. Johannes has won five of six races this year, including the Grade 1 Shoemaker Mile at Santa Anita. His only loss was a second in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Mile.
“We originally thought about giving the horse a breather,” Yakteen said. “He had such a strong campaign and he came out of the Breeders’ Cup so well. I talked to [the owners] and we said we would play it by ear and maybe head to the San Gabriel. Everything was near perfect in his last outing, so we came to the San Gabriel and now we will head to the Pegasus. In my heart, he is a true champion. I hope others view it that way.”
The $300,000 Grade 1 La Brea Stakes was won by longshot Kopion ($77.40) by 2¾ lengths.
“We are high as a kite right now,” Eric Gustavson, owner and president of Spendthrift Farm, said. “We had a bunch of friends and family come in for the race. It was such a crazy day because we had Tamara and she scratched. We got the text from Richard this morning, so we were all down. Now this. This is racing. It is great.
“This is such a big deal. A Grade 1 winner on the dirt for Omaha Beach. … We are over the moon.”
In the final stakes of the day, She Feels Pretty ($3.20) won the Grade 1 $300,000 American Oaks for 3-year-old fillies going 1¼ miles on the downhill course. She bided her time for most of the race until the top of the stretch where she swung wide and won by 2 ½ lengths.
“It’s really special,” said trainer Cherie DeVaux. “She is a filly that as an early 2-year-old, she was kind of like an ugly duckling. She just needed to grow into herself. Still, she won her first time out going 5½ furlongs and now she is up to a mile and a quarter so it has been quite rewarding to watch the process.”
This is the 90th year for Santa Anita and the track is in a fight for survival. Because California racing does not get subsidies from gambling, it is at a huge disadvantage when it comes to purses. Horses running in California make about half of what they could in Kentucky, where purses are supplemented by the Historical Horse Racing gaming system.
In addition, when it comes to making an opening day filled with horses from across the country, Santa Anita is at a huge disadvantage because FedEx, the shipper of most horses in the United States, stops all equine shipping early in December so all its efforts can go to delivering holiday packages. It leaves trainers and owners in a difficult position. To run at Santa Anita on Dec. 26, they would have to ship the horse to the track in early December. With that comes all the expenses of having an assistant trainer and groom here for almost a month.
Finally, the continually shrinking foal crop has made race fields small, a turnoff for bettors who like full fields to offer more options. After the Stronach Group, owner of Santa Anita and Gulfstream, closed Golden Gate Fields in Northern California, a plan has been offered whereby horses there can train at Pleasanton and Santa Anita would pay for them to be vanned south for possibly a fourth day of racing.
It’s unclear if that will be enough to entice Northern California horses to run in the south or if they are better moving elsewhere. It’s also unclear if the summer Fair Circuit can survive if most of its horses have gone.
Despite all the problems, Bob Baffert, the most recognizable and arguably most successful trainer in the U.S., remains a bullish ambassador for California racing.
“The crowd, the families, you see everybody brings their children and families and a lot of people became racing fans by coming on opening day,” Baffert told FanDuel TV before the stakes races. “You can’t beat the weather in California. We’ve got that beautiful day, great cards, got the Derby winner running here today, so it’s really good racing.
“I think they did a great job with the stakes racing they have, and they’re all competitive, tough races, so we’re looking forward to it.”
