Golden Gate Fields 2019 Fall Meet – The Oakland Stakes

Golden Gate Press Office/Matt Dinerman —-

BAJA SUR DEFEATS OLDER RIVALS IN THE OAKLAND STAKES
Saturday, November 17, 2019

3-year-old gelding Baja Sur transferred his winning form from Emerald Downs to Golden Gate Fields

3-year-old gelding Baja Sur transferred his winning form from Emerald Downs to Golden Gate Fields in the feature race at Golden Gate on Saturday afternoon, displaying a lethal turn of foot down the stretch to win the $50,000 Oakland Stakes for sprinters 3-years-old and upward.

After breaking alertly from post position 2, Baja Sur dueled on the lead for the first quarter mile with eventual runner up finisher Sigur Ros. After conceding the lead to the aforementioned rival by the far turn, Baja Sur came on again in upper stretch, opened up on the competition late and finished the six-furlong contest 4 and a 1/4 lengths clear of Sigur Ros. 8-5 favorite Oiseau de Guerre could only manage to be third while Smokey Image, the longest shot in the field, rounded out the superfecta. Indian Zip, My Friend Emma and Quick and Silver completed the field.

“It looked like there was a lot of pace in the race,” said winning jockey Juan Hernandez. “I wanted to get him out of the gate and put him in a good spot. In the race, I saw Sigur Ros going at the far turn and I took back. [Baja Sur] relaxed pretty well for me at that point. I was waiting to make my move on the far turn but for a moment I didn’t think [Sigur Ros] would stop. When I asked my horse to go at the quarter pole, though, he moved really well to the wire to win. He is a very nice horse.

Winning trainer Blaine Wright was extremely pleased with his sophomore gelding’s performance.

“We knew early on this was a good horse,” said Wright. “He ran great at Emerald and we decided to test the waters in Northern California He’s proven to be very good down here so I’m very thankful. Many thanks to the owners, John and Janene Maryanski and Riverbend Farm (Gayle and Gerald Schneider). Without them, I would have never gotten this horse.”

Baja Sur, a sale topper at the 2017 Washington Yearling Sale, won four races at Emerald Downs in Auburn Washington by a combined 21 lengths. His two-back effort, a second-place finish behind sharp Southern California gelding Fashionably Fast, was his first career loss. With the Oakland Stakes victory, Baja Sur improved his career record to 5-4-1-0 with career earnings of $136,800. The Washington bred son of Smiling Tiger is out of the mare Premo Copy, a stakes winner herself and dam of 7 other winners.