Paving never has gone out of training since her commendable debut victory Aug. 23 at Ellis Park, but only in Thursday’s featured seventh race does Paving start for the second time.
While her breeze pattern is checkered and includes a drill over the all-weather training track at Keeneland, Paving worked back following her Aug. 23 race on Sept. 6 and has drilled nine times since beating 11 rivals in that six-furlong Ellis debut. Sister Troienne, third in that race, has since won all three of her starts, including the $100,000 Wait a While last week at Gulfstream. Fourth-place Runadhara returned to capture a Keeneland maiden sprint.
Paving faces five other 2-year-old fillies in a six-furlong dash restricted by age and sex and open to non-winners-of-two allowance horses or $125,000 claimers. Collective Beauty, from the Brad Cox barn, figures to be the second choice, but Luv Your Neighbor gets the nod to pull a minor upset.
Luv Your Neighbor got up very late in her career debut, a Colonial Downs sprint run over a sloppy track, to beat the useful filly Prosecco Rita. Luv Your Neighbor floundered second out over Woodbine’s Tapeta surface, and in November posted two fast dirt works at Fair Grounds for trainer Michael Stidham.
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