PATRICK IS BACK!

VALENZUELA BACK, EXERCISING HORSES AND HIMSELF

His newly-issued license to exercise horses in hand, Patrick Valenzuela was circulating around the stable area Friday morning, happy to be back and looking to get aboard as many horses as he could.

It was announced Thursday that under terms of a stipulated agreement between Valenzuela and the California Horse Racing Board, he would be granted an exercise rider’s license while his jockey’s license remains suspended through October 31. At that time he will be eligible to re-apply for the jockey’s license subject to CHRB review.

“I’ve got to lose some weight, and this will give me time to do it,” Valenzuela said.

Valenzuela, who will turn 53 on October 1, has more than 4,300 wins in a career begun in 1978 among them the 1989 Kentucky Derby and Preakness aboard Sunday Silence. He has seven Breeders’ Cup wins and two TVG Pacific Classic victories, winning the inaugural aboard Best Pal in 1991 and, 20 years later, the 2011 edition aboard Acclamation.


LA JOLLA HANDICAP DRAWS 10

A field of 10 is entered in Sunday’s $150,000 Grade III La Jolla Handicap, the second leg of Del Mar’s turf stakes series for 3-year-olds. Soul Driver, winner of the Opening Day Oceanside Stakes, first event in the series, was not entered, precluding the possibility of a series sweep which has been accomplished twice since 1998.

From the rail out for the 1 1/16 mile run the field is: Tried and True (Martin Pedroza, 10-1), Hero Ten All (Tyler Baze, 12-1), Om (Fernando Perez, 7-2), Over Par (Mario Gutierrez, 20-1), Cross the Line (Rafael Bejarano, 8-1), Papacoolpapacool (Gary Stevens, 3-1), Pain and Misery (Martin Garcia, 15-1), Pretentious (Santiago Gonzalez, 20-1), Prospect Park (Kent Desormeaux, 5-2) and Royal Albert Hall (Flavien Prat, 10-1).



SWIPE SWINGS FOR GRADED STAKES WIN IN BEST PAL

Trainer J. Keith Desormeaux took a look at the past performance sheet for Saturday’s Grade II $200,000 Best Pal Stakes, noted that his Swipe was the 2-1 favorite in a field of six, and nodded his head in approval.

“I think he should be,” Desormeaux said. “He’s training like a favorite should.”

Swipe, a 2-year-old Kentucky-bred son of Birdstone, served notice with a maiden-breaking victory in the $85,000 Summer Juvenile Championship at Los Alamitos on July 12. The win by a head over Mrazek, who scored impressively in Wednesday’s $100,000 Graduation Stakes here, came in the third start for Swipe. He had finished second in a May debut at Santa Anita and then was third in the Tremont at Belmont Park in June, a race in which Best Pal entrant Paynes Prairie finished second.

He’s had two workouts over the Del Mar track, the most recent, what Desormeaux termed “a nice three-quarter breeze (1:14.40), last Saturday.

Hall of Fame jockey Kent Desormeaux, Keith’s younger (by three years) brother has been up for all of Swipe’s starts and will be again Saturday. “We’ve had no hiccups with him along the way and he’s ready to go,” Keith said. 

Swipe has come from off the pace in his three previous starts, the first at 4 ½ furlongs and the next two at 5 ½. The Best Pal is 6 ½.

“He’ll rate and he’s bred for distance so the extra eighth shouldn’t bother him,” Desormeaux said.

The Best Pal is the major prep race for the Grade I $300,000 Del Mar Futurity on Closing Day, September 7. “That’s the obvious hope for all of us,” Desormeaux said.

The field for the Best Pal, which goes as the fifth on a 10-race card, from the rail out:  Found Money (Corey Nakatani, 5-1), Paynes Prairie (Martin Pedroza, 5-2), Bistraya (Gonzalo Nicolas, 20-1), Swipe (Kent Desormeaux, 2-1), Nyquist (Mario Gutierrez, 3-1), and Annie’s Candy (Tyler Baze, 4-1).


SADLER HOPES ELEKTRUM CAN AVOID TROUBLE IN MABEE

Elektrum has one win, two seconds and a fourth-place finish in four 2015 starts since being imported from France and placed under the care of trainer John Sadler late last year.

The combined margin in the three defeats for the 4-year-old Irish-bred daughter of High Chaparral: 2 ¼ lengths.

“She’s been the best in almost every single start, but she’s had trouble in every one,” Sadler said Friday morning. “She’s very close with all of these. She’s been kind of unlucky.”  

The trouble lines in the past performances show Elektrum was “off slow,” “steadied,” “steadied” and was “boxed in” in her four starts this year.

Elektrum, unraced since a fourth-place finish in the Grade I Vanity at Santa Anita on May 25, will be given her next chance for a U.S. graded stakes win when Sadler sends her out Saturday as part of a field of nine in the Grade II $250,000 John C. Mabee Stakes for older fillies and mares at 1 1/8 miles on the Jimmy Durante Turf Course.

Like fellow Mabee entrant Personal Diary, Elektrum was entered in the Osunitas Stakes on July 18 but scratched when rains forced the race to be taken off the turf and run on the main track.

“She loves the (Mabee) distance. She just needs a good trip,” Sadler said.


The field for the John C. Mabee , which goes as the eighth on a 10-race card, from the rail out: Notte d’Oro  (Flavien Prat, 15-1), Emotional Kitten (Gary Stevens, 4-1), Fanticola (Joe Talamo, 5-2), Stormy Lucy (Rafael Bejarano, 4-1), Personal Diary (Brice Blanc, 15-1), Gusto Dolce (Martin Pedroza, 20-1), Queen of The Sand (Drayden Van Dyke, 7-2), Elektrum (Victor Espinoza, 6-1) and Blingismything (Tyler Baze, 12-1).