SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Two years ago, D. Wayne Lukas had heart-related problems for which he needed a pacemaker and stents. On Monday, it was evident those devices are working just fine.
Watching his 2-year-old Sporting Chance well on his way to victory in Monday’s Grade 1, $350,000 Hopeful Stakes at Saratoga, Sporting Chance abruptly ducked out six paths about 50 yards from the wire. Somehow, jockey Luis Saez stayed on the colt, got him straightened out and was still able to win the Hopeful by a neck over Free Drop Billy.
The win – Lukas’s eighth in the Hopeful Stakes – wasn’t official until the stewards conducted an inquiry and listened to an objection from Robby Albarado, the rider of Free Drop Billy, which they ultimately dismissed.
“It surprised me more than it did the horse,” Lukas said of Sporting Chance’s antics. “I thought he was comfortable in front and he was moving well. I think the last 50 yards we would have seen him accelerate, that’s his style. Unfortunately, he saw something. Luis said he ducked from the whip. I have a tendency to think it might have been something else, you never know. You have to remember these are 2-year-olds and it’s just his third out. You can see stuff like that happen every day in 2-year-old racing.”
Saez said he hit Sporting Chance left-handed to try to teach him something.
“He’s one of the best horses I ever rode in my life and I want him to learn a little bit more, but, Jesus, when he came out like that I thought I was going to fall,” Saez said. “He’s a good horse. He was still going. When I grabbed him a little bit he straightened right up.”
Dale Romans, the trainer of Free Drop Billy, stood on the track, looked at the stewards’ stand and raised his arms in disgust with their failure to disqualify the winner.
“Horrible decision,” Romans said. “You can’t tell with a 2-year-old who's run three times in his life and a horse bolts in front of him how much it stops his momentum. If they all stay straight, he may run right past him. He gets beat a head with a horse that bolts right in front him … that’s a ridiculous call.”
Sporting Chance won his maiden here on the front end. On Monday, he sat just off of National Flag through a quarter in 22.50 seconds and a half-mile in 45.92.
Sporting Chance took control turning for home and was two or three lengths in front before he ducked out. Free Drop Billy, five-wide down the backside under Robby Albarado, kept coming wide down the lane and just missed. He finished a head in front of the maiden Givemeaminit.
It was four lengths back to Firenze Fire in fourth. He was followed, in order, by National Flag, Oskar Blues, Mojovation and Psychoanalyze.
Sporting Chance, a son of Tiznow owned by Robert Baker and William Mack, covered the seven furlongs in 1:23.71 and returned $13.40 to win.
Lukas said Sporting Chance could start next in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland on Oct. 7.
