10 sophomore fillies set to battle in 6.5F sprint

Welcome to Sydney for our coverage of the prestigious G3 “The Oh No! Somebody won the 3 Man Jackpot Stakes!”. Allright, maybe it’s not prestigious and the race didn’t even exist until I bought it Sunday morning. Yes it was me, not Given or Lenny that bought this race. They knew nothing about it until after the fact. Whatever – we have ourselves a nice field given the circumstances!

This fine race is the final race in Sydney this afternoon, following up 3 whoppers in the Sydney Mile, Sydney Sprint and the world famous Sydney Derby. The 3 aforementioned races have a combined purse of $3,500,000 and have brought a who’s who of sim horses to our track today! For those of you that are still awake and not quite broke yet, our race here should prove to be a fine finale for this wonderful day!

Let’s take a look at our 10 starters:

1) More Raspberry (19-1) – Wilko

Devil’s Bag x Gilded Time x Danzig

This Devil’s Bag filly is in way over her head. She finally wins a small 7 horse allowance race and her owner suddenly has delusions of grandeur and enters her against graded company. Nice going dummy – watch your horse finish last now.

2) Crossland Drive (9-2) – ssj4vegeta

Southern Halo x Gone West x So Blessed (ENG)

I think this is our filly to beat today. Crossland Drive enters this race off a sizzling stakes win in Illinois 3 weeks ago, and 2 races prior to that she was a very close 4th place in the G1 Equinics turf sprint. She owns the field’s high SF of 95 and is a multiple stakes winner. What’s not to like here. This filly always fires in sprints and today will be no exception.

3) Torch Song (8-1) – gradetwo

Woodman x Seattle Slew x Alydar

Here is our token super stable entry! Torch Song is a stalemate of the famous Rhibus, who will be one of the horses to beat in the Bluegrass Derby 2 weeks from now. Strangely this filly seems to be bred to run really far, yet her owners have not allowed her to run her beyond 8.5F, and are now backing her up to sprints once again. Is this the ole blindfold and dartboard method to entering horses again? We’ve seen this before from these guys! I’m joking of course – lighten up people! Torch Song would look like a nice contender if it weren’t for her debacle in the last turf sprint she tried. That race looks so bad that it probably was a throwaway fluke. She is a nice filly and could surprise here.

4) Blue Smoke (5-1) – eomer

Smoke Glacken x A.P. Indy x Caro(IRE)

This filly is mine and since I bought the race I get the top jockey! Ha! Well actually Blue Smoke was at the top of the stakes point list anyway. Blue Smoke had all the looks of being a 2YO summer star, but has been revitalized since she turned 3. In 3 starts as a sophomore she has 2 stakes wins and a 5th place finish in a G1 route. She is back to sprints where she belongs now. Contender.

5) Go Now (20-1) – billmill

Hennessy x Danzig x Mr. Prospector

A year ago this filly would of been a heavy contender. She started her career off by winning her first 3 turf races and 4 out of the first 5 turf starts, including a stakes win. But things have gone sour since then. Perhaps it’s the heavy schedule of races? I’m not sure, but she’s going to have to gear it up 4 or 5 levels to be competitive here.

6) Fusaichi Inferno (7-1) – correction

Fusaichi Pegasus x Nureyev x Green Desert

 Fusaichi Inferno comes in to our race following a nice allowance score at the Ascot racetrack 3 weeks ago. She is a stakes winner from 4 races ago as well. She is almost always competitive and she should be a player here. It will take a decent step up to win, but it’s not out of the question and she certainly should factor in our exotics.

7) Paradise (7-1) – cooldude

Gone West x Storm Cat x Pretense

This one owns the title for the best bred filly in our race today. It doesn’t get much better than Gone West x Storm Cat. Luckily Paradise has rewarded cooldude and all those bp’s he spent on her – because she is by far our biggest winner in the field with 7 career wins. 6 of those wins are turf sprint stakes races! Yikes, can she be beat? She ran poor in her last race, a long turf sprint stakes. Perhaps the cutback to 6.5 furlongs will do the trick. Or maybe she needs a few months off after a rough campaign of stakes the past year. Either way she’s deadly if she decides to fire. This could be stakes win #7 for her this week.

8)  La Santa Cruz (4-1) – santacruz3

Aldebaran x Mr. Prospector x Danehill

La Santa Cruz may be the most talented filly in this field. Despite being heavily inbred to Mr. P (2X2), she shows no signs of wear from that. La Santa Cruz is a stakes winner and is even graded placed. 2 races back she barely lost to the great Malindi in the G3 Intercontinental Mile. She backs down to a sprint where she fired her career high SF, and has run in the 90’s twice already. Huge chance and huge contender.

9) Soaring Hero(AUS) (5-1) – devil

Danzero(AUS) x Mr. Prospector x Northern Dancer

Soaring Hero is a 5 time stakes winner and will be making her 14th career start this afternoon. This heavily raced filly has lost her form a bit in her last 2 races, which is magnified in her last race where for the first time ever on grass, she never saw the lead at all. She probably will find the lead today – but can she hold it? Perhaps. The ability is there is she can shake off her last 2 races.

10) Spirit of America (8-1)  – harvey

A.P. Indy x Mr. Prospector x Koiro Trelay(NZ)

Spirit of America enters today’s race off a very nice stakes win in Wisconsin and has won 3 of her 4 career races on the lawn. She is our second (unless I missed another? lol) super stable entry in this race. You must respect her impressive record on grass and I think this filly has every capability of jumping up bigtime here. Her lone loss on grass was probably the stakes debut blues that most horses seem to encounter. She’s over that now. This would be a great filly to bet if you’re looking for a price. Good chance!

Picks:

1) Crossland Drive

2) Spirit of America

3) La Santa Cruz