True Valour © Benoit Photo
DAY 5
MURTAGHS EXPLORE NEW GROUND WITH EDDIE READ ENTRANT
John Patrick and Orla Murtagh left their five children back home in Ireland to journey to a place they’d never been before, Del Mar, with the goal of guiding the 4-year-old colt True Valour to a successful run in today’s Grade II $250,000 Eddie Read Stakes.
They arrived late in the week. They’ve got a first-hand look at the place ‘Where the Turf Meets the Surf.’ Now it’s up to the Irish-bred True Valour, who’ll be making his U.S. debut after 14 starts in England and Ireland.
It qualifies as a new experience for John Murtagh, one of the most accomplished jockeys in Europe in a career that spanned from 1987-2013 – some of them spent as the contract rider for The Aga Khan and Coolmore.
“This is my first time at Del Mar and my first ever runner in America (as a trainer) so I’m very excited about that,” Murtagh said Saturday morning. “I was at Hollywood Park in 1989, galloping horses for Paddy Gallagher and came back about 10 or 12 years or so later to ride a few horses for Richard Mandella.
“But this is my first time at Del Mar.”
The same for Orla.
“It’s everything I expected from what we can see on TV at home,” Orla said of Del Mar. “It’s gorgeous, really lovely. I love the idea of the American lifestyle where you have everyone at the track for six or seven weeks. At home we do so much travelling, we’re all over the place.”
The style in Europe is for trainers to have their own “yards,” complete with training venues, from which they prepare horses to run and then ship to various short-term meets. The Murtaghs’ facility, where they have 51 horses to train, is about a mile from The Curragh Racecourse in County Kildare.
“We’d never be sharing over in Ireland. We all have our own yards, a mile or two apart,” Orla said.
Sheikh Fahad Al Thani, head of Qatar Racing, selected the Read as a good spot for True Valour, a son of Kodiac with three wins in 14 career starts, who comes in off a victory in the Group III Ballycorus Stakes at Leopardstown on June 14, his third race of the year.
“Sheik Fahad felt that it would be a nice race for the horse,” John Murtagh said, citing the 1 1/8-mile distance as a good one for True Valour.
“It’s a tough race, but he’s a pretty consistent horse. Pretty tough, genuine and straightforward. It looked like a good opportunity, so here we are and we’ll see how we go (today).
“He was training well at home, we’ll have to see how he traveled over. Usually, he’s a good traveler.”
Murtagh, 48, recorded his first win in 1987 and had a nearly 30-year career among the top riders in Europe before his retirement in 2013.
Victories in the Irish Classics, all the Group I events at Royal Ascot, the English Derby, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Diamond Stakes and the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe are on his list of accomplishments as well as being the champion rider of Ireland five times. In the U.S., he notched three Breeders’ Cup victories – aboard Ridgewood Pearl (1995 Mile), Kalanisi (2000 Turf) and Man of Iron (2009 Marathon) – from 30 mounts.
ESPINOZA INJURED, BOBBY ABU DHABI DIES IN WORKOUT ACCIDENT
Hall of Fame jockey Victor Espinoza was taken to Scripps La Jolla Hospital with undetermined injuries after his mount, Bobby Abu Dhabi, suffered an apparent heart attack and died on the track during a workout at approximately 9:05 a.m. Sunday.
Espinoza, 46, lay motionless for several minutes before being fitted with a neck brace and being taken to an ambulance on a stretcher. His agent, Brian Beach, reported from the hospital that Espinoza was being examined after experiencing shoulder pain and numbness.
Bobby Abu Dhabi, a 4-year-old son of Macho Uno, owned by Gary Hartunian’s Rockingham Ranch and David Bernsen and trained by Peter Miller, was in training for next Saturday’s Grade I $300,000 Bing Crosby Stakes.
Bobby Abu Dhabi was working in company with stablemate El Huerfano who was scratched from Saturday’s San Diego Handicap, when Bobby Abu Dhabi fell between the sixteenth pole and the wire.
In three 2018 starts, Bobby Abu Dhabi had finished second in the Grade I Triple Bend at Santa Anita in March, won the Grade II Kona Gold there in April and finished third in the Grade II True North in June at Belmont Park. The 2018 campaign had accounted for $230,000 of a career $375,100 in earnings in nine starts.
Espinoza was aboard for Bobby Abu Dhabi’s last four starts, dating to December of last year. The colt’s only Del Mar start was his racing debut on November 19 of 2016, a narrow victory under Norberto Arroyo, Jr.
ACCELERATE WORKS; MAY BE SADLER’S DESIGNATED CLASSIC RUNNER
Accelerate, scratched from Saturday’s Grade II $200,000 San Diego Handicap – which was won impressively by stablemate Catalina Cruiser – worked five furlongs Sunday morning in :59.60 under exercise rider Juan Leyva.
The work was the fastest of 69 at the distance.
“I had him in a minute. He went very well,” Sadler said.
Sadler scratched Accelerate and Curlin Rules from the San Diego and singled Catalina Cruiser, a 4-year-old son of Union Rags who was undefeated in two previous starts for the race. Accelerate, Catalina Cruiser and Curlin Rules are all owned by Hronis Racing LLC. An allowance race which had been an optional choice for Catalina Cruiser didn’t get enough entries to go, prompting the move that proved successful when Catalina Cruiser, ridden by Drayden Van Dyke, went wire-to-wire, pulling away to a 6 ¾-length winning margin that earned his second straight 107 Beyer speed figure.
In the winner’s circle after the San Diego, Sadler said he’d see how Catalina Cruiser and Accelerate trained before deciding upon a single entrant for the $1 million TVG Pacific Classic on August 18. Sunday morning, he indicated the nod would go to Accelerate.
“Accelerate will go in the Pacific Classic, that’s the plan,” Sadler said. Asked about the possibility of sending Catalina Cruiser to the East for a major stakes, Sadler said: “Could be, but I really haven’t thought much about it. I haven’t thought about much beyond (the San Diego performance).”
Curlin Rules also worked Sunday morning, going five furlongs in 1:01.60.
The two winners saddled by Sadler on Saturday were Nos. 445 and 446 at Del Mar and moved him past Ron McAnally (445) into third place on the track’s all-time list behind Bob Baffert (480) and Mike Mitchell (476).
CROWDED LEADERBOARDS FOR JOCKEYS, TRAINERS
Familiar names occupied the top places on the jockey and trainer leaderboards entering the final day of the first week of the meeting. But the lead for defending riding champion Flavien Prat and four-time training champion Doug O’Neill was a single victory.
Prat had five wins from 26 mounts. Drayden Van Dyke and Mario Gutierrez notched four wins apiece from 15 and 14 mounts, respectively. Tyler Baze (3-for-24) was next and six riders had two wins in the first four days of the meeting. The two wins by apprentice Asa Espinoza from 20 mounts increased his career total to 40, the point from which his weight allowance dropped from seven to five pounds per mount.
In the trainer standings, Doug O’Neill and Hall of Famer Jerry Hollendorfer, who dominated opening day with four and three wins respectively, maintained their established positions. O’Neill has seven wins from 30 starters and Hollendorfer six from 15. Peter Miller (3-for-16) is next with John Sadler (2-for-6), Val Brinkerhoff (2-for-3) and Simon Callaghan (2-for-6) tied for fourth.
CLOSERS – Selected works from 185 officially timed Sunday: Psycho Dar (4f, :48.10), Skye Diamonds (4f, :51.00), Accelerate (5f, :59.60), Curlin Rules (5f, 1:01.60), El Huerfano (5f, 1:01.00), Ransom the Moon (5f, 1:01.20), Spiced Perfection (5f, 1:00.20), St. Joe Bay, 5f, 1:00.80), Yuvetsi (6f, 1:12.80)…Trainer Peter Miller said that War Heroine, winner of Saturday’s $200,000 Grade II San Clemente Stakes, came out of the effort in good shape and would be targeted for the Grade I $300,000 Del Mar Oaks on August 18 … Apprentice jockey Asa Espinoza gets an opportunity to ride a stakes race on dirt for the first time on Wednesday when he’s named on Little Scotty for trainer Vladimir Cerin in the $100,000 Grade III Cougar II Handicap, a 1 ½-mile marathon that has been used as a stepping stone to the TVG Pacific Classic in the past. A field of seven is entered. Espinoza, the 18-year-old nephew of Hall of Fame jockey Victor Espinoza, rode one stakes previously, an event on the downhill turf course at Santa Anita.