Gulfstream: Delgado ‘Confident’ in Mythical Ahead of Juvenile Debut
By David Joseph —-
Delgado ‘Confident’ in Mythical Ahead of Juvenile Debut
2YOs Return to Gulfstream with Races Thursday and Friday
HALLANDALE BEACH, FL – Arindel’s Mythical, a bay homebred daughter of St Patrick’s Day, has thrilled her connections and figures to draw plenty of attention from bettors as South Florida’s juvenile season gets under way Thursday at Gulfstream Park.
The first 2-year-old race of the year features fillies sprinting 4 ½ furlongs over the main track in a maiden special weight that goes as Race 2 on an eight-race program that kicks off at 12:50 p.m.
Favored at 8-5 on the morning line in an overflow field of 11, Mythical shows six timed works for her unveiling, the last two coming this month over Gulfstream’s main track after four breezes at Arindel’s farm in Ocala.
“We are very confident with her. She has done everything really good since she came to the barn. It’s amazing how smart she is at this stage of her life,” trainer Jorge Delgado said. “She’s a very quiet filly in the stall. She’s very game and professional in her breezes. She does everything real easy when she breezes. She hasn’t been asked and she’s breezed really good times.
“I don’t have one horse at this stage that is smarter than that one,” he added. “That being said, that’s the reason she’s in the first race of the season. She’s a little filly. She’ll need to grow more down the road to be in the big leagues, but for the race tomorrow I think she’ll be more than fine.”
In her most recent work Mythical went three furlongs from the gate in 35.28 seconds April 10 after going the same distance in a bullet 36.10 seconds seven days earlier. Emisael Jaramillo will ride from Post 2.
Group 3-placed in Ireland, St Patrick’s Day has already had one maiden winner at Gulfstream during the Royal Palm Meet, 3-year-old filly Shelovestotravel April 5 in her race debut. His best horse to date has been Fiona’s Magic, who won the Davona Dale (G2) and was second in the Forward Gal (G3) last winter at Gulfstream.
“They seem to be very fast out of the gate,” Delgado said. “I’m very confident in this filly. She acts so professional. The two riders that I’ve had on her have been in love with her, she does things so easy. The one time I breezed her from the gate she breezed super. She beat an older horse for fun, I would say, in company that day. I think she should be very solid.”
Arindel will also be represented Thursday by Drama, a homebred daughter of Brethren that has also breezed six times with her last three coming at Palm Meadows, Gulfstream’s satellite training facility in Palm Beach County, for trainer Carlos David. She drew Post 9 and is rated at 6-1 in the program.
MHM Stables and JWS Racing’s Bohemian exits the OBS March 2-year-old in training sale and has worked three times, once on the turf, at Palm Meadows. Co-owned and trained by Jack Sisterson, she is by freshman sire Essential Quality, a four-time Grade 1 winner and champion at both 2 and 3 that is seeking his first winner.
“We haven’t had her long,” Sisterson said. “Since we got her to Palm Meadows she’s done everything right and showed us signs she’s forward. She’s been good at the gate so we decided to go ahead and run her. We don’t want to take anything away from her but she strikes us as forward enough to run 4 ½ [furlongs], I think. It’s all about the break in those baby races.”
Bohemian fetched $85,000 at the sale for Sisterson and his majority partner before the month was out had her first timed breeze March 28 at Palm Meadows.
“We liked her physically. She didn’t breeze extremely quick, but we spoke to the people at [consignor] Top Line [Sales] and they were very positive about her training the whole winter,” Sisterson said. “Being by Essential Quality we thought she had a good mind at the sale. Speaking with the majority owner, he liked her, too, so we decided to try and get her.”
Bohemian drew Post 6 and will be ridden by Edwin Gonzalez.
“We breezed her once on the turf and she went very well. She’s by a Kitten’s Joy mare so I think long-term she might wind up on the turf and you might see a better performance there,” Sisterson said. “But, she’s forward enough tomorrow. It looks on paper like Jorge Delgado’s filly is very quick from the inside. Obviously she’ll be the one to beat, but we’ll just play the break and go from there.”
Goldie Glory, Rumpus in Paradise, Tosca, Willow Case, A Rose for Skyler, Instapurchase and Deborahaprophetess complete the field. Ruth the Moabitess is the lone also-eligible.
Juvenile racing continues Friday with a 4 ½-furlong maiden special weight that also goes as Race 2 on a nine-race program. Like Thursday it was also oversubscribed with 13 entries, including three on the also-eligible list. Among the colts and geldings are a pair of fillies – Chance to Party and Luna Estrella.
“We’re excited to see the 2-year-old season start early at Gulfstream Park with overfilled races for both girls and boys,” vice president of racing Mike Lakow said.
There will be a carryover of $16,555 in the $1 Super High Five (Race 8) Thursday. The 20-cent Rainbow 6, which produced multiple mandatory payoffs of $6,047.50 on Sunday’s last live program, begins anew spanning Races 3-8.
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