By Ben Massam
In the aftermath of Airoforce (Colonel John)'s recent last-place finish as the favorite in the Feb. 20 GII Risen Star S. at Fair Grounds, trainer Mark Casse and his team could not find anything noticeably wrong with their multiple graded stakes-winning colt. As such, the John Oxley colorbearer has been given the green light to take one more crack at a spot in the GI Kentucky Derby starting gate in Saturday's GIII Spiral S. at Turfway Park, which offers 50 qualifying points to the winner and an increasingly rare graded stakes opportunity over an all-weather surface.
“We're still not really sure what happened [in the Risen Star],” said Casse on an NTRA conference call Tuesday. “We brought him to Ocala, which is home for us, and went over him from head to tail and really haven't found a whole lot to giving him an excuse.”
Winner his first two starts on turf, including a score in Keeneland's GIII Bourbon S. last October, Airoforce finished a neck short of Hit It a Bomb (War Front) when second in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf later that month. The gray completed his 2-year-old season with a decisive score in the slop in the GII Kentucky Jockey Club S. Nov. 28, a race that gave many high hopes for his future on dirt. With that future now in question, Casse said he is holding out hope a win in the Spiral may set him up for another try over Churchill's favorable surface.
“It's my feeling that horses that have a turf tendency or a synthetic tendency seem to be able to handle Churchill better than the average dirt race track,” added Casse. “That's keeping us in the game.”
One rival who has no questions to answer over the local surface is Surgical Strike (Red Giant), who swept past 11 rivals with an eight-wide bid en-route to a sharp win [video] in the Mar. 12 John Battaglia Memorial S., the traditional local prep for the Spiral. The chestnut, a second-out maiden winner over the testing Kentucky Downs turf course, closed belatedly to finish fifth behind Airoforce in the Bourbon in his next start. Following a subsequent series of honest efforts on grass, the Ben Colebrook trainee appears to be right at home going long over the local synthetic track.
“Two turns is what he wants to do,” Colebrook told Turfway Park's press team. “I wanted to see how he would handle the Poly. He came out of the [Battaglia] great. He ran a big race that day, considering how wide he was and how he got shuffled back on the first turn.”
It has been five years since Team Valor International and trainer Graham Motion sent out Animal Kingdom (Leroidesanimaux {Brz}) to victory in the Spiral, a win that served as a springboard to glory on the first Saturday in May. The pair teams up again Saturday with Kasseopia (GB) (Showcasing {GB}), owned in partnership with Gary Barber, for this year's renewal. Runner-up in his North American debut in Woodbine's GIII Grey S. last October, the chestnut missed the break and mounted a wide rally to complete the trifecta behind Frank Conversation (in the Feb. 13 GIII El Camino Real Derby at Golden Gate–his first start for Motion. Kasseopia has posted four intervening workouts on dirt at Santa Anita and figures to stay a bit closer to the pace with a cleaner start.
Cindy and Larry Jones' Jensen (Haynesfield) will likely also be prominent in the early stages off a comfortable front-running tally in a Feb. 25 Fair Grounds optional claimer. The homebred comes to Turfway in hopes of following in the footsteps of his dam-sire, Hard Spun (Danzig), who Larry Jones conditioned to a win in this race in 2007. Never out of the exacta in four starts, the colt retains the services of regular rider Florent Geroux.
Like Jensen, Reddam Racing homebred Ralis (Square Eddie) also makes his first start on synthetic in the Spiral. The lone Grade I winner in the field by virtue of his score in last summer's GI Hopeful S. at Saratoga, Ralis has gone off form since then and recently finished a distant 10th in Oaklawn's GII Rebel S. Mar. 19.
Alto Racing's Azar (Scat Daddy) proved his ability over turf at Saratoga with a maiden victory in the GII With Anticipation S. last September and augmented his resume with a last-out allowance score on dirt at Gulfstream Feb. 28. While solid form on both surfaces is only a predictor of a horse's proclivity for the synthetic, trainer Todd Pletcher has shipped a number of winners into Turfway in recent years, including 2014 Spiral winner We Miss Artie (Artie Schiller).
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