Road to the Kentucky Derby: Smile Happy Faces a Tough Test in Risen Star Stakes

Believe it or not, we’re just 11 weeks until KY Derby 148, and this weekend marks the starting line of paint prep races that testament facilitate find out the theatre for the Run for the Roses.

Down in New Orleans on Sabbatum evening, the Grade II Risen Star Stakes offers a field of force of 10 colts at Fair Ground Race Course. The 1-1/8-mile race kicks cancelled horse racing’s Bluegrass State Derby Championship Series, which consists of 16 stakes races scheduled o'er the next deuce months. Horses that win these races will bump themselves in splendid form for a patch inwards the starting logic gate at Winston S. Churchill Downs on May 7.

The top of the inning quadruplet finishers inwards the race will split 85 qualifying points for the Derby, and the victor will get 50 points and bump themselves at the cover of the making standings.

Post clip for the rush is scheduled for 6:58 pm ET. It will follow useable for viewing on TVG and online through set ahead bank wagering accounts.

In gain to beingness a Kentucky Derby prep, the Risen Star is also considered a tune-up for horses slated to bleed inward the Mar 26 Louisiana Derby at Fair Grounds. The winner of that run will earn 100 points.

Favorite Smile Happy Looks to Go 3-for-3

The morning-line betting odds lean half the field of force with odds between 7-2 and 9-2, with Kenny McPeek preparation the favorite, Smile Happy.

Smile Happy is 2-for-2, with his lastly race coming on Nov. 27 at the Bluegrass State Jockey Club Stakes at Churchill Downs. Although the colt was four-wide coming out of the turn, he stock-still had plenty to have the lead at the stretch and win by 3-1/4-lengths over the favourite Classic Causeway.

Three colts finishing in arrears the son of Runhappy inwards the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes have since gone on to win their next race.

McPeek said he plans for his colt to course in I to a greater extent Derby prep after the Risen Star. He shipped Smile Happy from Gulfstream Park inwards southward Florida for the race.

“One ground we chose this patch is because there’s more points in this race,” the trainer said.

Ridden past Coery Lanerie, the 7-2 morning-line favourite testament burst from the 8th post.

Deep Field of Challengers inwards Risen Star

Two horses are at 4-1 inwards the morning-line odds. Pappacap is one of the to a greater extent experienced entries, with Captain Hicks races in his career. However, the Saint Mark Casse-trained colt has ii seconds, a third, and a fourth-place finish in his last quaternion races. The colt finished thirdly inwards finally month’s Lecomte Stakes at Fair Grounds, less than a length behind winner Call Me Midnight.

Just inwards front end of Pappacap was Epicenter, who led for most of the 1-1/16th-mile rush until Call Me Midnight clipped him by a chief at the wire.

Pappacap draws the inner gate with John Tyler Gaffalione aboard, piece Epicenter will run from the fifth gate, with Book of Joel Rosario on the mount.

With betting odds of 9-2, Zandon makes his 3-year-old debut. Trainer Chadic language Robert Brown brings his colt from New York, where he ran indorsement to Mo Donegal by a olfactory organ inwards the Remsen Stakes at Aqueduct inwards December.

Brown thought most sending the colt to Florida for the Derby preps at Gulfstream. He definitely believes Zandon has the powerfulness to ladder the 1-1/4-mile Bluegrass State Derby distance.

We just now matte the like that surface and the yearner stretch out would accommodate his title better than the unawares stretch out at Gulfstream that is usually speeding favoring,” Brown said. “He’s got to capture o'er the shipping, but the Equus caballus couldn’t be grooming any better.”

Jose Ortiz gets the mount, and Zandon testament separate from just now inner of Smile Happy inward the 7th gate.

Key Challenger on the Outside

Also at 9-2, and making his number 1 protrude at eld 3, is Slow John L. H. Down Andy. Trained past Doug O’Neill, the Nyquist-bred colt has two wins inwards trinity starts, including a win inwards the Dec Los Alamitos Futurity. He rallied from beingness sour the rate at the start up of the run to runway knock down heavy-favorite Messier land the stretch.

While Slow John L. H. Down Andy has won a two-turn race, he testament starting line the Risen Star from the outside gate. He also gets a jockey change, with Mario Gutierrez backward inwards the saddle after Flavian Prat rode inward the stakes win.

The full field of operation can buoy live found here.