Keith Desormeaux was noncommital on whether or not he would enter his star pupil Exaggerator (Curlin) in the July 30 GII Jim Dandy S. after being underwhelmed by the colt's breeze Saturday morning.
Exaggerator, last seen finishing 11th as the 7-5 choice in the GI Belmont S., worked six furlongs in 1:13.80 under Junior Alvarado before galloping out in 1:30 flat for seven panels.
“I asked him a little bit, but he didn't really gallop out much,” said Alvarado, who rode Exaggerator to victory in last year's GII Saratoga Special S. “But he was stretching his legs and I think he did very good. He went good, relaxed, settled, finished up nice.”
Desormeaux was less impressed. “I got him in 1:14, galloped out 1:30, so he slowed up pretty quickly,” the 49-year-old conditioner told the NYRA notes team. “He was clipping off 12-and-changes pretty easily the first half, but he slowed down pretty good; he went the last quarter in 25 and change. It wasn't a perfectly planned work–I wanted the first part of the work to go, like in 13, and finish up, but he was pretty aggressive, and after an eighth or so, Junior did say he settled, so that was good. I'm processing what he did last week and this week, and the predominating thought is that he's not finishing as good as I want him to. Now, as a trainer, is that because he's not fit enough, or is he struggling with the track?”
The question in Desormeaux's mind is whether to go ahead and enter the Jim Dandy or to train up to the Aug. 27 GI Travers S. “That's what I'm going to have to struggle with during the week–off of that work, it doesn't seem like he's tight enough, or he's struggling with the track,” he said. “It's making me leery on running him in the Jim Dandy–the Travers is the real goal. So we'll see what the next couple of days bring, but there is the chance I might skip the Jim Dandy, because he didn't finish with the vigor I wanted to see. I would rate today's work a C or a C-plus.”
Desormeaux, who won last year's Jim Dandy with Texas Red (Afleet Alex), is scheduled to return to California Sunday and will rely on assistant trainer Julie Clark to keep him updated on Exaggerator's progress early next week. “We want to do what's best for the horse,” he summed up. “That's going to lead to the ultimate decision.”
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