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DEL MAR -- Race #2 -- TOP MONEY (#1)
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The 2nd race is a starter allowance for 2 year olds who broke their maidens for $40,000 or less and have never won two races. Par is a 99. Typically at this level we won't see many 2 year olds with a par figure and none of these have actually earned a 99 final figure yet but it's likely to see them get near that today with improvement. TOP MONEY (4-1) won his debut on July 29th at Del Mar with a 95-96+ effort and looked like he was capable of stepping up a notch.
The winning effort was even better than it looks on paper and he made some moves in that race that aren't obvious from the running lines. He actually broke in 7th place in a 12 horse field and was well behind the top group of horses for the first part of the race but actually moved into 2nd position while 3 wide by the time the leader had started into the far turn. When a young horse makes that kind of move down the backstretch to get into contention they usually withdraw when the field hits the stretch run but TOP MONEY continued to advance on the outside of the leader and then wore him down to win going away. The 96+ final figure he earned was almost a length above the par for the maiden level. Trainer Adam Kitchingman is very good but still under-rated and TOP MONEY has a sharp recent workout at 6 furlongs. A better start and typical 2nd time out improvement would put him at the top of today's group.
On raw figures, LOREN V. has the best combination of pace/speed with his 103-98 victory in a Md40000 race back on June 23rd. He battled very hard early to establish position on the rail and then held on at the wire by a nose. There are some positives and some negatives on LOREN V. He was claimed from Doug O'Neill by Bill Spawr from that maiden win and Spawr has won with 10 of his first 38 starters here at Del Mar. Also, Doug O'Neill does not click at a high percentage with his first time starters so the fact that LOREN V. won his debut for O'Neill was interesting and now he gets to move from the rail to an outside post. Tyler Baze rode him in the win and now stays aboard for the new connections.
The flipside is that LOREN V. has not raced in 63 days which is a little outside my comfort window of 43 days when I'm trying to play a horse off their last set of figures. LOREN V. has better looking figures than the other speedster LOTTA LOOT but there may be enough of an early battle to wear LOREN V. down in the final yards. Today's 6 furlong distance is also an 1/8th of a mile longer than his debut at 5 furlongs. I would definitely cut him some slack if he didn't look as impressive today as he did in his debut race. I'll use LOREN V. as a contender and us him with TOP MONEY in the exotics. PROUD GENERAL hung in the final yards of his last race and settled for 2nd. His last 2 efforts are not as good as his first two efforts. He and SILENT EXPLOIT have raced each other in the last 2 starts and are very closely matched.
TOP MONEY is the spot play win bet and key over the speedy LOREN V. and LOTTA LOOT. PROUD GENERAL regularly clunks around for the minor awards and could also be used under TOP MONEY. Good luck.
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The 2nd race is a starter allowance for 2 year olds who broke their maidens for $40,000 or less and have never won two races. Par is a 99. Typically at this level we won't see many 2 year olds with a par figure and none of these have actually earned a 99 final figure yet but it's likely to see them get near that today with improvement. TOP MONEY (4-1) won his debut on July 29th at Del Mar with a 95-96+ effort and looked like he was capable of stepping up a notch.
The winning effort was even better than it looks on paper and he made some moves in that race that aren't obvious from the running lines. He actually broke in 7th place in a 12 horse field and was well behind the top group of horses for the first part of the race but actually moved into 2nd position while 3 wide by the time the leader had started into the far turn. When a young horse makes that kind of move down the backstretch to get into contention they usually withdraw when the field hits the stretch run but TOP MONEY continued to advance on the outside of the leader and then wore him down to win going away. The 96+ final figure he earned was almost a length above the par for the maiden level. Trainer Adam Kitchingman is very good but still under-rated and TOP MONEY has a sharp recent workout at 6 furlongs. A better start and typical 2nd time out improvement would put him at the top of today's group.
On raw figures, LOREN V. has the best combination of pace/speed with his 103-98 victory in a Md40000 race back on June 23rd. He battled very hard early to establish position on the rail and then held on at the wire by a nose. There are some positives and some negatives on LOREN V. He was claimed from Doug O'Neill by Bill Spawr from that maiden win and Spawr has won with 10 of his first 38 starters here at Del Mar. Also, Doug O'Neill does not click at a high percentage with his first time starters so the fact that LOREN V. won his debut for O'Neill was interesting and now he gets to move from the rail to an outside post. Tyler Baze rode him in the win and now stays aboard for the new connections.
The flipside is that LOREN V. has not raced in 63 days which is a little outside my comfort window of 43 days when I'm trying to play a horse off their last set of figures. LOREN V. has better looking figures than the other speedster LOTTA LOOT but there may be enough of an early battle to wear LOREN V. down in the final yards. Today's 6 furlong distance is also an 1/8th of a mile longer than his debut at 5 furlongs. I would definitely cut him some slack if he didn't look as impressive today as he did in his debut race. I'll use LOREN V. as a contender and us him with TOP MONEY in the exotics. PROUD GENERAL hung in the final yards of his last race and settled for 2nd. His last 2 efforts are not as good as his first two efforts. He and SILENT EXPLOIT have raced each other in the last 2 starts and are very closely matched.
TOP MONEY is the spot play win bet and key over the speedy LOREN V. and LOTTA LOOT. PROUD GENERAL regularly clunks around for the minor awards and could also be used under TOP MONEY. Good luck.
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