HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – If Rezasrolex is the undisputed king of the local Tapeta course, Great Venezuela is surely the queen.
Rezasrolex has posted seven consecutive victories over Gulfstream Park’s synthetic track while Great Venezuela has won six of seven, a record she should be heavily favored to improve on when facing six rivals in Sunday’s $100,000 Islamorada, an overnight handicap for fillies and mares to be decided at 5 1/2 furlongs.
Great Venezuela has split her time between the turf and synthetic track during her 15-race career, although she has clearly been more successful over the Tapeta. She won a similarly conditioned overnight handicap over the surface here on June 28 while posting a career-best 96 Beyer Speed Figure.
Trained by Victor Barboza Jr. for Orlyana Farm, Great Venezuela has made her last two starts on grass. She finished second, beaten just a length as the 8-5 favorite, in the Incredible Revenge Stakes at Monmouth Park on Aug. 3 before shipping to Del Mar to run fourth in the Senator Ken Maddy Stakes on the Breeders’ Cup Friday program.
Trainer Jose D’Angelo will counter the favorite with a pair of contenders, led by the speedy Twirling Queen, who has not been too shabby herself over the Tapeta, having won her only two starts over the surface. Twirling Queen will return to the synthetic off a steady diet of turf races and is exiting arguably one of her best performances, a very game head victory in a strong allowance at Keeneland on Oct. 23. She weathered a race-long pace battle to prevail by a head for her seventh victory in 16 lifetime tries.
“She was very good early in her 3-year-old season, then tailed off so we changed a lot of things because it just seemed she wasn’t happy with what she was doing,” D’Angelo said. “And right now she’s doing great. Way better than she was last year even at her best. She’s back home now, knows this track very well, and should run big again on Sunday.”
D’Angelo will also send out Sporting Lady, a 3-year-old daughter of Munnings who joined his barn earlier this month after registering a stunning upset at odds of 34-1 against allowance opposition over the Laurel Park turf on Nov. 2 for trainer Keri Brion.
“She’s adapted really well to Florida and her new surroundings at Palm Meadows. I know she’s got to take a big jump off her number last time, but if the fractions are fast she’s going to be right there at the end,” D’Angelo said.
Sporting Lady is one of four 3-year-olds in the lineup, along with Me Governor, Win N Your In, and Amazonia. They will face the old veteran Choose Joy, now a month shy of her ninth birthday, who was the undisputed leader of this division earlier in her career and who returned from a 14-month layoff to defeat allowance company over this course on Oct. 3.
Lynch, Jaramillo start quick
Trainer Brian Lynch and jockey Emisael Jaramillo got off to quick starts at the Championship meet, winning a pair of races each on Thursday’s opening-day program.
Lynch’s training double included an impressive win by the promising 2-year-old filly Sister Troienne in the Wait a While, a race switched from the turf to Tapeta due to rain.
Jaramillo, who finished sixth in the jockey standings with 40 winners during the 2024-25 Championship meet, guided Insolenta and Vindicate Cha Cha to back-to-back tallies for trainers Jorge Delgado and Michael Lerman, respectively, in the sixth and seventh races.
Sister Troienne was ridden in the Wait a While by Mario Gutierrez. It was the first mount the veteran had accepted locally since winning the Grade 1 Florida Derby aboard Nyquist for trainer Doug O’Neill in 2016 as a stepping-stone to his popular victory five weeks later in the Kentucky Derby.
◗ Jockey Katie Davis, who has moved her tack from New York to Gulfstream for the winter, notched her first victory on the meet on Friday aboard the 3-5 Etendre in the eighth race, a mount she picked up late for trainer Saffie Joseph Jr.
Davis’s brother Dylan, who is currently recuperating from serious injuries incurred in a riding mishap recently at Aqueduct, was a regular here for the first time in four years last winter, winning 38 races and $2.37 million despite sitting out the first five weeks of the meet.
Ryan Bond, the son of trainer Jim Bond and Davis’s agent since the start of the year, will handle her riding engagements locally.
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