A trifecta of stakes are on the menu today at Aqueduct, including a pair of simulcasts from Lone Star Park outside Dallas.
Before the rains came, the Grade 3, $150,000 Bed o’ Roses Breeders’ Cup Handicap at the Big A had a heavy favorite in Honest Lady, the California shipper who easily won the Distaff Handicap here March 25.
But yesterday Honest Lady’s trainer, Bobby Frankel, called NYRA racing secretary Mike Lakow to scratch the filly because of the off-track. Without her, the mile Bed o’ Roses becomes a more evenly matched affair.
Off her last start and her slop pedigree, Up We Go rates the edge.
As the 2-1 favorite in the Next Move Handicap at Aqueduct March 26, Up We Go – who wears the Bohemia Stable colors that graced the mighty Kelso – was boxed in tight along the rail for most of the stretch run. She finally burst through inside the final sixteenth but fell a neck short of Biogio’s Rose, who had clear sailing on the outside.
Up We Go is bred to love it wet, being a daughter of Waquoit, by Relaunch, from the mud-loving In Reality sire line. She already has a win and a second from two starts over off-tracks.
Biogio’s Rose, a horse for the course at Aqueduct, also loves the goo but gives three pounds to Up We Go. Look for a big race from longshot Oh What a Windfall, who won the Tempted Stakes here going a mile as a 2-year-old. She’ll be flying late.
The two simulcasts from Texas are the $300,000 Lone Star Derby at 1 1/16 miles for 3-year-olds and the Grade 3, $300,000 Lone Star Mile for older horses.
The Lone Star Derby offers its winner a $1 million bonus if he can go on to win any of the Triple Crown races, but there are no top Kentucky Derby contenders in the eight-horse field.
Big Numbers, second by a neck to stablemate Snuck In in the Rebel last out, drew the rail and rates the favorite’s role.
But stretch-running Nature, winner of the Battaglia Stakes at Turfway Park last month, picks up a new rider in Eclipse Award winner Jorge “Chop Chop” Chavez. Nature has faced much better in his career and can take this at a price with a powerful late run.
Fans of the turf-to-dirt handicapping angle will like Where’s Taylor in the Lone Star Mile. In his last start he finished second, beaten less than a length, facing some of the nation’s best grass horses in the Explosive Bid at the Fair Grounds, and since then worked a “bullet” five furlongs in :59.1 over the Lone Star main track.
Luftikus, Forty One Carats and Sir Bear are the chief opposition.