Clay Daisy Special doesn’t fail to excite

Though not as tight as the oddsmakers predicted, Virginia race fans were still treated to a thrilling ending, with Kill The Messenger(IRE) took the field gate to wire, holding off a determine charge by Silk Spectre(ENG) to grab her second career stakes victory in this week’s Clay Daisy Special. Along with being her second stakes victory, this was also her impressive sixth win in in eight career races. She set a new benchmark for the race, posting a speed figure of 102.28, a career best for her. She also broke the 150K mark in career earnings in this start. The stakes win also propelled her to a top 50 ranking among three year old fillies in Turf Sprints, pushing her to a number 43 ranking. I earned the right to pass on my weekly helping of humility this week, by actually making a good call on this one, but that didn’t help the payouts, which were predictably low in this short odds field. The winner paid $7.60 $3.40 $2.70 acroos the board. Exotics were meager at best with a $25.30 payout in the exacta, and $58.70 in the trifecta.

Kill The Messenger blasted out of the gate in this one, like her tail was on fire, quickly leaving the rest of the field behind. She had three and three quarters on the field as they passed the first call, and had nearly doubled that by the half, passing the halfway post with a solid six length lead. At a point in the race wheere the closers typically start pressuring, in this one they found themselves just trying to hold the pace, and Kill The Messenger had tacked on another quarter length as they crossed into the stretch and headed for home. With the race looking to be in the bag, veteran jockey O. Ridenour took his foot off the accelerator, and it nearly cost him. What he didn’t see was Silk Spectre fire up the jets, a distant eight and a half lengths out to his inside. Suddenly, with the wire in sight, we had a race, with Silk Spectre having chewed up seven and a half lengths in a matter of seconds, and driving toward the wire like a runaway train. A final desperate lunge carried Kill The Messenger across the wire a length ahead of Silk Spectre. Race favorite Confectionary(AUS) held her ground throughout the race, turning in the third place finish, four and three quarters out at the wire.