Sweet Azteca © Benoit Photo
Beat her if you can.
Pamela Ziebarth’s homebred filly Sweet Azteca has six rivals to outrun Sunday in the 53rd edition of the Rancho Bernardo Handicap for fillies and mares. Or to look at it another way, those six rivals have one special miss that they have to deal with – first, last and anything in between.
The gray daughter of Sharp Azteca is double fast and now primed to do some of her best work heading toward a likely start in the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint, a seven-furlong dash worth $1-million that will be contested at Del Mar on Saturday, November 2. It is the likely reason the Mike McCarthy trainee is “staying home” at Del Mar to run in the $100,000, Grade III Rancho Bernardo, rather than taking on bigger game for more money back east.
“A race over the track” is a racing phrase that rings sweet for those in the game. It’s a big edge, especially when you’re going for a million bucks and a possible Eclipse Award.
To put an underline under it and a double asterisk alongside it, the conditioner is importing his “go to” jockey from Saratoga, Del Mar’s six-time riding champ Flavien Prat, to take the controls on his 4-year-old. Prat has ridden her twice before and come away a winner both times. The Frenchman – with his exploits back east in the past few years – has now told the world he’s not only very good, he’s one of the best riders in the whole business.
Sweet Azteca has won four of her five lifetime starts, most recently setting a track record at Los Alamitos at the Rancho Bernardo distance of six and one-half furlongs. She’s won a total of $421,200 in purses, with the best yet to come.
She’ll pack topweight of 126 pounds Sunday, conceding from five to 10 pounds to her rivals.
Putting a cherry on top of it all, is her numbers in Jeff Siegel’s morning line. He’s hung her 2/5, which is just about as low as you can go in this game.
The Rancho Bernardo will be Race 8 on the nine-race card with an off time of approximately 5:35 p.m. The afternoon’s first post, as per usual, will be 2 p.m.