Time to Eat Crow
The Zipperhead Special didn’t quite have the results to it that I thought. I was pretty sure that at least two of my top three picks would come in that I recommended boxing an exacta using all three horses. Boy, was I ever wrong.
The race started off well, with my top pick, Amaterasu going straight to the front. I anticipated that Miss Sullivan would present a challenge for that spot, but she willingly sat back in the second spot, and allowed Amaterasu to take a good three length lead to the half mile pole.
Unfabulous, my second pick, sat gamely a stride behind Miss Sullivan, making my exacta look pretty darn good. But then things caved in. Jockey Bates, who held Miss Sullivan off the lead, set her free. She quickly galloped up and easily overtook Amaterasu and pulled off to a decent 2+ length victory in a speed of 102.
Miss Sullivan wasn’t the only one that passed Amaterasu. South of Heaven rallied to get up for second and breaking a streak of poor finishes.
Monsun JR CB ran a decent race, running towards the front, got up for third, ending a streak of races of not finishing on the board.
Amaterasu took the forth spot followed by my third pick, Otto Tribute. Otto was the favorite in the race and although I didn’t feel she would be the victor, I thought she was in a spot where she could hit the board. Otto ran fifth throughout the race and was never a factor.
Famous Indy ran in the rear of the field, although she was not the caboose as I had predicted. She ended up spotting the field too much distance that she could not make up. By the third call, she was a good 13 lengths behind. She sliced this down almost by half to finish behind by 7 and ended in 6th.
Freudian Humor was flat in the race and finished 7th and proved to be outclassed.
Unfabulous, my second choice, lived up to her name. She was well positioned early but put in the worst turf start of her career. Finishing eighth, she beat out one horse, barely…
Bodog Bandit watched the entire race from the rear of the field and extended her woes in graded stake racing (now 0 for 9) She is much more competitive in non-graded stakes, in fact can be dangerous at that leve. This level proved to be too much for her.