Saturday, July 17, 2010

Home Field Handicapping

Brian Zipse author of Zipse at the Track has Arlington Park and I have Delaware Park, both of which are hosting a card full of some big, juicy stakes races. It seems Brian has gotten all the Arlington races sorted, leaving me to the task of picking apart the trio of stakes at Delaware.

The R.R. Carpenter Jr Memorial Stakes kicks things off and features the Delaware monster Our Edge. Unbeaten in two starts at DE, both coming at a mile and one sixteenth, he looks to extend that streak to three in a row. He also owns the fastest final clocking over the Delaware Park strip in the field, when comparing times for 8.5 furlongs at Delaware Park. Alama d'Oro will be the horse to keep the Delaware Dominater honest early. He has a dominating win and a place in two starts over the surface and is unbeaten at 8.5 furlongs. Edgewater, will complete my top three. He will likely get first jump at the two leaders and possibly wrest the lead away if both run each other into the ground early.

Second on the list of stakes is the Robert G. Dick Memorial featuring the talented, but unlucky and complicated Gozzip Girl, however this is a prime spot for an upset and I'm picking Rcuandry to do it. With a win and a second going 12 furlongs, distance should not be a problem in this start. She has been second in her last two starts and may just get the chance to leap into the winner's circle. Gozzip Girl does bring her backclass to this race and who knows what would've happened had she not lost the rider last out. She does own a dominant win at 10 furlongs, suggesting one more eighth should not be a problem. My final pick is Tresna, the only horse with a win at Delaware Park and an on the board finish at 11 furlongs. In that race she was gaining and lost only by a neck.

Lastly is Delaware Park's feature, the Delaware Handicap where the New York stars Life at Ten and Funny Moon square off with Obeah Stakes winner Miss Singsix and the gritty Milwaukee Appeal. Though she has yet to be tested at the distance I'm going to start off by eating chalk with Life at Ten. Her breeding suggests that the distance should not be a problem and she has already beaten many of these fillies before. Next, if there is a horse who can pull an upset, I like Milwaukee Appeal. She was good enough to run against the colts as a 3yr old and light up the board each time. She owns a third to Eye of the Leapord and a second to Careless Jewel when running at 10 pannels, so distance is a non issue. To round out my final top three is Miss Singsix. I'll never leave a horse with a home field advantage out of my top three, not at Delaware Park. She's never raced at 10 furlongs, but is always making up ground when running at 9.

So, here are my top three for Delaware Park's terrific trio, now who do you like?

1 comment:

  1. LOL, thanks for the mention Dani. Your picks did better than my longshot selections at Arlington; well done. Life at Ten continues to roll, a meeting with Rachel may come calling on August 29 at Saratoga. Fun, fun!

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