With Honors © Zoe Metz for Del Mar Thoroughbred Club

 

Del Mar will feature an attractive stakes doubleheader Saturday, presenting the Grade III $100,000 Jimmy Durante Stakes for two-year-old fillies and the Grade II $200,000 Seabiscuit Handicap for older Thoroughbreds. Post time for the first of nine races will be 12:30 p.m.

 

The Durante Stakes, honoring the memory of one of America’s most beloved comedians, is carded as the sixth race at one mile on Del Mar’s infield grass course which also is named for the entertainer, while the Seabiscuit Handicap will be run at a mile and one-sixteenth on the turf as the eighth event.

 

The Durante drew a wide-open field of 13 fillies – Defiant Honor, Mike Smith; Bella Luma, Gary Stevens; Movette, Santiago Gonzalez; Journey Home, Drayden Van Dyke; Tiburtina, Victor Espinoza; Partyinthepaddock, Kent Desormeaux; How About Zero, Mario Gutierrez; With Honors, Flavien Prat; Noble Dancer, Fernando Perez; Simmy’s Temple, Norberto Arroyo, Jr.; Miss Sugars, Tyler Baze; Happy Mesa, Martin Pedroza, and La Force, Brice Blanc.

 

Likely favorite is With Honors, victress in the Juvenile Fillies Turf last summer at Del Mar. Among those posing a threat are Defiant Honor, Mo’vette and Happy Mesa.

 

Seabiscuit Handicap entrants are A Red Tie Day, Arroyo; Stylistics United, Pereira; Om, Stevens; Vyjack, Prat; What A View, Baze; Hunt, Smith; Ring Weekend, Van Dyke, and Hi Happy, Altair Domingos.

 

Morning line favorite is Om, coming into the race off a nose loss to Obviously in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint, his third consecutive runner-up finish. Also certain to be well-backed in an attractive betting race are Vyjack, What a View and Ring Weekend.