ARCADIA, Calif. - California trainer Marcelo Polanco needed slightly more than 24 hours at Santa Anita on Friday and Saturday to equal his win total for 2025.
On Friday, Gran Oriente, a Group 1 winner in Chile last May, won for the first time in the United States in an allowance race at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course. Gran Oriente paid $19.80 to win.
On Saturday, Queen Sienna, a minor stakes winner in Peru in 2024 and 2025, won an allowance race for fillies and mares at 1 1/8 miles on turf, her third start in this country. She paid $24.60.
Polanco, 65, has not had more than five winners in a year since 2016, when he won 9 races from 52 runners. Last year, he had 2 wins from 55 starters. The difference, he said on Sunday, is better horses.
“You’ve got to have the players,” Polanco said. “If you have a baseball team and your guys aren’t good, you won’t win games.”
Polanco, a native of Chile, has only three runners in his stable, including the 7-year-old Argentine-bred mare Violeta M, a five-time stakes winner in Argentina in 2023 and 2024.
Gran Oriente, 5, finished 11th of 13 in the Breeders’ Cup Mile at Del Mar on Nov. 1 for trainer Jose Alvarez. A winner of 4 of 14 starts, Gran Oriente earned a fees-paid berth to the BC Mile with a win in the Group 1 Gran Premio Club Hipico Falabella at 1 1/4 miles on turf last May in his final start in Chile.
In his first start after the BC Mile, and first start for Polanco, Gran Oriente finished last of 10 in an allowance race at a mile on turf at Santa Anita on Jan. 11. Polanco said Gran Oriente needed time to adjust to American racing. Friday’s race was his first start in a sprint since a win at about 6 1/2 furlongs in Chile in 2024.
“Sometimes, it takes a while to understand the horse,” Polanco said. “South American horses can take longer to acclimate.”
Polanco noted he had the same sort of success in early 2024 with the Argentine-bred Irideo, who lost eight consecutive races on turf at a mile or more before winning the Clocker’s Corner Stakes on the hillside turf course in a 19-1 upset.
Polanco is hopeful that Queen Sienna can show further improvement. She won for the eighth time in her 17th start on Saturday.
In Peru, Queen Sienna excelled in stakes from 1 1/8 miles to 1 1/4 miles. Queen Sienna was fifth and seventh in allowance races in October and December at Del Mar and Santa Anita in her first two starts in this country.
“I think she’s 100 percent now,” Polanco said. “When she first came here, she had some issues, mainly adapting to the American racing.”
Violeta M is nominated to Saturday’s Grade 3 Megahertz Stakes for fillies and mares at a mile on turf. She was last of 11 in the Grade 3 Goldikova Stakes for fillies and mares at a mile on turf at Del Mar on Nov. 1 in her third start in this country.
The trio make for an abbreviated training chart on Polanco’s office desk. Polanco insists he is comfortable with a small stable.
“I’m at an age when I’m not worried about it,” he said on Sunday morning in his office. “I’ve done this since I was 16. I grew up at the track in Chile.”
The office walls are covered with poster-sized winner’s circle photos commemorating such wins as Blue Stripe’s victory in the Grade 1 Clement Hirsch Stakes at Del Mar in 2022, and Irideo’s win in the Wickerr Stakes at Del Mar the same summer.
“I’ve got more at the house,” Polanco said.
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