Yellow Agate May Upstage Nonna Mela in Frizette
- Nick Costa
- Oct 6, 2016
- 4 min read
Photo Credit: Adam Coglianese/NYRA
Chelsea Durand
It's "Super Saturday" at Belmont Park with six graded stakes on the card, with four of them being grade ones with "Win and You're In" Breeders' Cup invitations on the line.
Older males compete in the $1 million Jockey Club Gold Cup, Older fillies and mares do battle in the $500,00 Flower Bowl, while the young 2-year old colts and fillies look to earn respect in the $500,000 Champagne and $400,000 Frizette respectively. The latter race is the one I will focus on for this blog.
The Frizette Stakes (GI), run as a one-turn mile over Belmont’s main track, has drawn a field of a half-dozen 2-year old fillies, all of them making their Grade 1 debuts, and competing for an automatic berth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies in four weeks. The winner of the Frizette will also receive 10 points towards the Kentucky Oaks Points Leaderboard, which will determine the entrants for the 2017 Kentucky Oaks.
As expected in the juvenile stakes category, the entrants are extremely light on experience, with five of the girls having only a maiden win on their resumes. Half the field has raced 6-furlongs, the other half have traveled an extra half furlong, so everyone is in the same boat when it comes to stepping up in distance. Question is, who can do it best?
Let's take a look at the field from the rail out with jockey assignments.
1 - Sky Gesture - Mike Smith - Shook off early pressure from speedy rivals in her wire-to-wire maiden score in her debut at Saratoga. She'll probably be challenged again early.
2 - Libby's Tail - Irad Ortiz, Jr - One of only two in here with graded stakes experience. As the race favorite last out in the G2 Adirondack Stakes, she disappointed her backers as she weakened late to a 4th-place finish.
3 - Nonna Mela - Javier Castellano - The morning line favorite is the other horse in this event with graded experience. She has now won two in-a-row, the latest being a six-length romp against a good field in the Adirondack mid-August. She has been training really well in the interim.
4 - Yellow Agate - Manuel Franco – This filly her debut just last month, here at Belmont, by turning in an impressive showing, rallying from off the pace to win by a half-length. The victory earned her the highest BRIS speed figure (93) in the field. Her latest work, which came a week ago, was a good one.
5 - Star Super - Trevor McCarthy – Another that owns stakes experience, but it came in the ungraded Sorority at Monmouth. In that spot she put in a respectable third place showing. Is she up for big-time improvement here in the graded ranks?
6 - Colorful Charade - John Velazquez - This stablemate of Libby's Tail posted a nice win, in front-running style, in her debut. The problem with the effort was that the winning speed figure was slow. She'll likely be putting pace pressure on the rail horse.
Analysis: Nonna Mela is the morning line favorite and for good reason. She is 2 for 3, including defeating rivals convincingly both in her maiden win and in the Adirondack Stakes. The latest romp came with a competitive speed figure (91). In addition, she's the only horse in here with a graded stakes win. She has an abundance of early speed, but will probably rate just in behind the two front-runners (1 and 6) to avoid getting used up early.
Alternatives to the Todd Pletcher-trained runner are not easy to come by, but I feel I have found one in Yellow Agate, who rallied impressively from mid-pack in her debut. She enters with the highest Bris speed figure, but I'm more impressed in the way that figure was earned.
The Christophe Clement-trained filly was bumped at the start and raced wide early, before going even wider into upper stretch. Despite her troubles, she still delivered a good late kick to get up in the last jumps. Her breeding also suggests that she can handle the extra distance of ground.
Trainer Clement has a 22% win rate with horses going a route of ground first time, plus a nearly identical win rate with horses coming off a maiden win. If she gets the needed pace up front, she's got the right running style to make an impact.
A little bit of improvement affords Sky Gesture a very good shot as well. She was a tough cookie shaking off three early foes, then pulling away to go on to what turned out to be an easy victory. If the outside horse doesn’t provide an early challenge, this filly could have a big say in the outcome. However, I believe she will get tested early and that will prove her undoing late.
The Play: Yellow Agate to win. Exacta's using her with Sky Gesture and Nonna Mela.
Comentarios