By Jim Charvat
DEL MAR PRESENTS ATTRACTIVE STAKES LINEUP THIS FALL
Another sign that Opening Day of the fall meet is drawing near: Entries were drawn Tuesday for the eight-race Friday card that kicks off the 13-day Bing Crosby Season at Del Mar.
This year’s stakes schedule is very similar to last year’s successful line-up. Of the 15 stakes, nine are graded. Over $2 million in purse money will be up for grabs over the course of the four-week meet, including the $300,000, G1 Hollywood Derby on Saturday December 2 and the $300,000, G1 Matriarch on Sunday December 3.
“Where we’re laid out on the calendar is perfect,” Del Mar racing secretary David Jerkens says. “There is just not that many graded opportunities at this time of the year so it becomes attractive. Especially to have a 3-year old race like the Hollywood Derby in December and then the Matriarch, a Grade I for fillies.”
The pair of Grade I’s are part of the popular Turf Festival that runs over the final two week of the fall meet. There will be eight turf races including the mile and a half, $200,000, G2 Hollywood Turf Cup on Friday November 24 and the $200,000, G2 Seabiscuit on Saturday November 25.
“I expect to receive the same support we received last year,” Jerkens says of the out-of-town trainers who ship in horses for the big races. “Mark Casse is sending a small string. Graham Motion. Wesley Ward has a few horses here. Obviously, the Breeders’ Cup has just wrapped up but based on past history we’ve received quite a bit of an influx from the Chad Brown and Christophe Clement barns back east.”
Opening weekend has a stakes race each day. The $75,000 Let It Ride Stakes will be run on Friday, the $75,000 Kathryn Crosby on Saturday and the $100,000 Betty Grable for Cal-bred fillies and mares on Sunday. Any movie buff by now has caught on to the theme of the fall meet as Del Mar pays tribute to Hollywood’s past.
The 2-year-olds get their turn on the stakes schedule in Week 2 with the $100,000 Desi Arnaz Stakes for juvenile fillies. It’s part of a stakes doubleheader on Saturday, November 18 with the $100,000 Cary Grant Stakes for Cal-breds also running that afternoon. Then Sunday, November 19 it’s the 43rd running of the G3 Bob Hope (formerly known as the Hollywood Prevue) for the 2-year olds.
The Turf Festival kicks off Thanksgiving Day with the G2 Red Carpet for fillies and mares going a mile and an eighth on the grass. It concludes December 3, closing day, with two races, the Matriarch and the one mile, G3 Cecil B. DeMille for two-year-olds, won last year by Speed Boat Beach.
A LUSH GREEN TURF COURSE AWAITS HORSES AT DEL MAR
Anyone who maintains a lawn at their home knows the two most difficult times of the year to keep the grass green are in the height of summer and late autumn, when the temperatures at night start to plummet.
Fortunately for Del Mar and it’s 10½-acre Jimmy Durante Turf Course, they have landscape superintendent John Beggin, who knows just what to do to keep the grass green through the upcoming Bing Crosby Season and its Turf Festival.
Beggin says they’ve been working on the turf course since the close of the summer meet in September.
“A lot of fertilizing,” he says, “and we blanket the track multiple times to help bring the soil temperatures up.”
Beggin admits they do some turf painting but it’s not for aesthetic reasons.
“It helps radiate heat,” Beggin notes, “to get it to recover and grow. Our soil is not ideal for warm season grass so we do anything we can to raise the temperature of the soil. That’s the key.”
Del Mar patrons will notice immediately the excellent job Beggin and his staff have done on the turf course. The lush green look of the course jumps out at you when you enter the grandstand. But looks aren’t everything. Safety is also top in mind.
“I try to keep a consistent softness to the grass,” Beggin says. “If the course starts to get firm we aerify it to soften it back up. The drier it is, the firmer it is. There’s kind of a fine line between keeping the moisture right where we want.”
The Jimmy Durante course consists of Bermuda grass and Beggin finds himself in a constant battle with Mother Nature and the persistent marine layer that blankets our coast.
“Bermuda really thrives off of UV’s,” Beggin contends. “Without direct UV’s it just doesn’t thrive as much.”
He says having Tropical Storm Hilary blow through back in September has helped with the maintenance of the turf course this fall.
“The rains really helped,” Beggin notes. “We don’t usually get that kind of rain during that season and it helped push certain salts and toxins out of the soil to have everything thrive.”
Turf racing is a big emphasis for the Bing Crosby Season but it’s no different for Beggin.
“Every time we race I feel pressure,” he says. “My ultimate goal is to keep everything consistent to where it has been in the past. All the way through the meet, in between seasons and into the next meet.”
COOLING OUT: 2022 Del Mar Debutante winner, And Tell Me Nolies, sold at last night’s “Night of the Stars” at the Fasig-Tipton November Sale at Keeneland for a cool $2.3 million. Eclipse Award winners, Nest and Goodnight Olive shared the sale topper honors, the hammer coming down on each at $6 million…64 horses were entered in the eight races carded for Opening Day Friday.