Hollywood Park Race Track - May 18, 2008 R2

Hollywood Park – May 18 2008, Race 2

The 4/20/08 race from which Almactia, Catch Candy, and Sweet Roseman exited, and in which Almacita finished third was handicapped already. Almacita out finished Catch Candy and Sweet Roseman as predicted in the analysis. Please see the 4/20/08 analysis under the Free House Handicap for more detail. I do not see anything significant that has changed since then, so I will eliminate both Catch Candy and Sweet Roseman who are 6-1 on the ML.

Almacita has switched barns from Mike Mitchell to A C Avila which is not favorable, but that alone shouldn’t be enough to conclude that Almacita isn’t going to run as well as last time. Although I would certainly feel more comfortable if Almacita had was still being trained by Mitchell, she cannot be overlooked.

Warren’s Sassy Cat is 15-1 ML and might outrun her odds. The horses that finished right behind her in her 4/3/08 race Beyers are in the 57-59 range. This one didn’t switch leads for the length of the stretch in that race so if she can iron that kink out, that will help. Furthermore on 4/3/08 her winning 6F time was 110.10. A horse named Oldtophatandtails in an earlier race that day won a 6F race in 109.51 which is about 3 ¾ lengths faster than the time Warren’s Sassy Cat took. Oldtophatandtails ran a 76 Beyer in his previous race, and he got a 78 for his 4/3/08 performance. If the 4/3/08 race was similar to his previous race, then that suggests Warren’s Sassy Cat’s 4/3/08 assigned Beyer of 69 might be reasonable.

So there is some conflicting data for me in regards to the strength of Warren’s Sassy Cat’s performance two races back. Was that performance closer to 61 or to 69? At any rate, I don’t think it’s enough to win, but this one might get a piece of it.

Decatur is trained by Jeff Mullins who can get them ready off of a layoff, but the numbers just aren’t close enough to justify a bet. It is possible this one will have a special affinity for the cushion track but I’ll let her show me.

Brides Folly is taking a huge class drop. In fact the drop is so huge off such poor efforts, that Carava may be testing the waters to see what the horse is capable of. Her sire Tale of the Cat does seem to do well over the synthetic surfaces. Nevertheless, I would like to have seen something better than 9th of 9, 7th of 8, and 8th of 9 in her last three. I’ll let her beat me.

Beau Chant I am going to stand against for the following reason. On 3/28/08 this horse ran 104.10 in winning a 32K maiden claimer, and two races earlier on that card, a horse named Lucky Mama ran the same 5 ½ F distance in 103.86 in a winning effort, which translates to about 1 ½ lengths faster. Lucky Mama was easily outrun by Almacita on 4/20/08. I have found that using time equivalencies to compare efforts usually does work well.

That leaves us with In Daddy’s Honor who finished second at this level last time out and won a 22,500-claiming race on 2/16. She is the 5/2 ML favorite and is trained by Mike Mitchell and is a contender.

A comparison of In Daddy’s Honor and Almacita is worth studying. Note that both In Daddy’s Honor and Almacita finished a head behind Applaud Dubai in their previous starts. Secondly, In Daddy’s Honor is trained by the more reliable Mike Mitchell as opposed to A C Avila trained Almacita. It is worth noting also that Almacita is being brought back in just 7 days off of a pretty taxing effort.

If Applaud Dubai ran the same race against both of these contenders, then it might be worth boxing them in an exacta. However, In Daddy’s Honor did out finish Almacita on 3/9/08 by 4 lengths though Almacita encountered a little traffic trouble turning into the stretch and going 6wide whereas In Daddy’s Honor cut the corner nicely into the stretch. Furthermore, in that race Almacita was in just a bit tight after the break as compared to In Daddy’s Honor who got away cleanly.

Note also that In Daddy’s Honor beat Gettinthereontime by 1-¾ lengths on 2/16/08 and Almacita finished 1 ¼ behind that one on 4/20/08. All in all, it is a close call, but I think there are enough tiebreakers that I would want to take In Daddy’s Honor over Almacita.

It is possible Decatur or Brides Folly could jump up and surprise us since in some ways they are X factors, but I think In Daddy’s Honor is the probably the most reliable horse to finish in the top two spots.

Win
In Daddy’s Honor (2)

Exacta
In Daddy’s Honor, Almacita BOX (1)

Total betting units = 4