Stephen Foster Attracts Top Stars
By: Nicolle Neulist, Blinkers-Off
This
year marks the 38th running of the Stephen Foster Handicap. The race takes its name from composer Stephen
Foster. Though Stephen Foster himself
hailed from the north, he wrote "My Old Kentucky Home", sung before
the Kentucky Derby. It has been run at 1
1/8 miles on the Churchill Downs dirt since its inception in 1982, and always
in June. It earned a Grade 3 in 1988, a
Grade 2 in 1995, a Grade 1 in 2002, and was brought back down to a Grade 2 as
of this year. Through its history, it
has been a rich source of Breeders' Cup Classic winners: Black Tie Affair
(1991), Awesome Again (1998), Saint Liam (2005), Blame (2010), Fort Larned
(2013), and Gun Runner (2017) all won the Foster the same year they won the
Breeders' Cup Classic. In addition,
Curlin (2008) won the Classic the year before he won the Foster.
In
addition to offering a $600,000 purse, the Stephen Foster Handicap is the first
stateside Win And You're In race of the year for the Breeders' Cup
Classic. (The first, the February
Stakes, was at Tokyo Racecourse; Inti won it on February 17.) This year, twelve
older horses plan to line up at the gate.
Among
the twelve are two of the top stars of the handicap division: Yoshida and Gift
Box. They both come into the Stephen
Foster with a bit to prove: Yoshida dazzled last fall, but has yet to
run back to that when going sixth in both the Pegasus World Cup Turf (G1) and
the Dubai World Cup (G1).
Gift
Box,
ascendant this winner in California, met his match in Vino Rosso in the Gold
Cup at Santa Anita (G1). Even so? This is a pair of proper G1 horses vying for
that bid into the Breeders' Cup, despite the fact that the Stephen Foster
itself has been made a G2 this year.
It's
a matter of slight preference between these two horses, as they're emphatically
the most likely winners. The mile and an
eighth distance, more than likely, plays into Yoshida's hands. Whether he is running on the lawn or the
dirt, Yoshida is a stone-cold nine-furlong runner. The ten furlongs of the Breeders' Cup
Classic, which he covered over this very course last fall? He wasn't a bad fourth, but he didn't have
quite as much punch late as he has going a little bit shorter. The one question is the pace, as Yoshida is
an off-pace type and there isn't a massive amount of speed in this year's
Foster, despite the massive field size.
But? Yoshida doesn't need a
torrid pace in front of him to get rolling from the middle of the pace. All in all, this looks a cozy spot for the
versatile son of Heart's Cry.
However,
it's hard to slight Gift Box.
Yes, he was the beaten favorite in the Gold Cup at Santa Anita, but it's
hard to say that was any kind of dent in his form. He did all the dirty work, battling on the
front with Blitzkrieg early and being beaten less than a length (while
Blitzkrieg faded to last). Though Gift
Box hasn't won at a mile and an eighth before, he has hit the board in two of
three tries, and he has not tried the distance since he got really, truly
good. The biggest question is how he's
going to be ridden. Gift Box has a
better chance if he sits back just a bit, but if he ends up doing more of the
dirty work up front so as not to let Tom's d'Etat get it too easy, that may
soften him up. Either way, he'll have to
be on his best to beat Yoshida at his best distance, but it would be no
surprise to see him at that best.
Speaking
of Tom's d'Etat? He could get a
nice run of things in this. If you toss
his sloppy, perhaps-a-bit-too-long Pegasus World Cup, you get a horse with
wonderfully consistent form. He has never run poorly in five starts over the
Churchill dirt, and he is already a two-time winner at a mile and an eighth. He
ran a good second behind McKinzie in the Alysheba; McKinzie played possum that
day, drew off late, and then franked the form with an excellent second behind
Mitole in the Met Mile last weekend. If something
strange happens and Tom's d'Etat doesn't get the lead? He doesn't need it. But, without any real front-end firecrackers
in this field, he may well get it, and he'll take catching.
Selections:
#12
Yoshida (7/2)
#6
Gift Box (3/1)
#9
Tom's d'Etat (5/1)
Longshot: The race has a handful of
longshots who might nab a share underneath. Quip won't be too far off
the pace; Thirstforlife is in career form. But, among them, #8 King Zachary (12/1)
appeals the most. King Zachary does have some tables to turn; he ran third last
out behind the aforementioned Thirstforlife.
But that was King Zachary's first race since last September, and it only
covered a mile. He now comes second off
the lay for his new trainer Graham Motion.
And, a mile (especially a one-turn mile!) is just too short for King
Zachary. Now he stretches out to two
turns at Churchill. His career form is
better at Churchill than anywhere else, and his last win came in the Matt Winn
(G3) a year ago -- a mile and a sixteenth in Louisville. And, being by Curlin out of a Giant's Causeway
mare, it would be no surprise to see him stretch out well -- as well as improve
at age four.
