Betting the chalk was a winning strategy Sunday at Emerald Downs, where post-time favorites won all four $50,000, six-furlong stakes on a 10-race card.
Blaine Wright saddled winners in the Auburn, Hastings, and Budweiser stakes en route to a four-win day that saw him pass Justin Evans in the trainer standings with 16 wins on the meet. Clovisconnection ($3.60) was the swiftest of his victors in the Budweiser Stakes, where the 5-year-old gelding took control in midstretch and held off a charging Slew’s Tiz Whiz to win his third race in four local tries.
Company’s Dream, who set early fractions of 21.52 seconds for the quarter and 43.71 for the half, finished third. The winning time was 1:08.56.
The first stakes sprint of the day was the Auburn, for 3-year-old colts and geldings. Prior to the race, He’s Not Talking lost his jockey and ran off, taking a full lap the wrong way around the track before he was collared and scratched. Once the actual race started, Wright’s 1-9 favorite Si That Tiger ($2.28) raced in fourth early before taking the lead in the stretch and defeating 22-1 stablemate Goin’ South by 1 1/2 lengths. It was another three-quarters of a length back to Candy Caballo in third.
The winning time was 1:08.62.
In the Hastings Stakes for fillies and mares ages 3 and up, Attracted, again trained by Wright, took the lead at the quarter pole and cruised from there, holding off Aloha Breeze by 1 1/4 lengths, with Brookys Gal coming in third. The winning time was 1:09.15, but Attracted, a 4-year-old filly ridden by Silvio Amador, suffered some sort of injury on her gallop-out and had to be vanned off the track.
Wright had no entrants in the Seattle Stakes for 3-year-old fillies, which opened up a spot in the winner’s circle for trainer Frank Lucarelli, jockey Isaias Enriquez, and the even-money favorite Saleen G T ($4.18), who held off Beauty Bark in the stretch to win by a neck. It was another three-quarters of a length back to Maximum Sparkle in third.
Prior to that race, Sapello Sonrisa, a New Mexico-bred who’d never raced outside of that state, shook free of her jockey and made a beeline for the stable area. She was scratched, and it’s anyone's guess if she made it all the way back to Albuquerque before sunset.
Sunday’s stakes were the first of the meet for Emerald, which this year is opting to consolidate its stakes racing into five days versus spreading big races out throughout the calendar. The $2,268,892 handle was a season high and the sixth highest on a non-Longacres Mile card since 2016. But with all four favorites winning, the 50-cent all-stakes pick four paid a measly $5.86.
:: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.