Trainer Charlie LoPresti had a welcome sight awaiting him at Santa Anita’s
Barn 36 Wednesday morning when Wise Dan emerged from the shedrow.
“When we took the blanket off, he put on quite a show bucking and kicking,”
LoPresti said of the reigning Horse of the Year and defending champion in the
Breeders’ Cup Mile. “It was great to see. You don’t want to see them come out
dull and almost sound asleep.”
LoPresti said Wise Dan’s schedule for the week would mirror last year’s
initial trip to Santa Anita, right down to the traveling party of three that is
comprised of LoPresti, exercise rider Damien Rock and groom Reeve McGaughey.
“I probably could have taken him out there this morning, but he had a long
day yesterday,” LoPresti said of Wise Dan’s journey that started with a van ride
from Keeneland to Louisville for a flight that left shortly after 2 p.m. (EDT)
and arrived at Santa Anita shortly before 5 p.m. (PDT).
“I will take him to the turf in the morning, paddock school tomorrow
afternoon and jog him on the dirt Friday morning,” LoPresti said. “He is on the
same schedule as last year except we got here a day later last year because of
Hurricane Sandy.
“He had the one work two weeks before the race and the little blowout down
the lane Saturday at Keeneland that did not make the tab.”
Za Approval arrived on Tuesday night as part of the contingent of New
York-based horses competing in the Breeders’ Cup and was out on the track for a
jog once around under Christophe Lorieul, the longtime assistant to trainer
Christophe Clement, and then he walked through the paddock.
The five-year-old son of 2004 Breeders’ Cup Classic winner Ghostzapper was
bright and alert after his long trip.
“He got over the track really good this morning,” Lorieul said. “It’s easy to
tell that he really likes this kind of weather and he trains better in it.”
Za Approval, winner of a trio of Grade 3 races this year, also enjoys
competing in California. In June, he was second to fellow Mile competitor
Obviously in the Shoemaker Mile at Hollywood Park before finishing second again
to prohibitive Mile favorite Wise Dan in the Woodbine Mile. He most recently
captured the Knickerbocker Handicap at Belmont Park over 1 1/8 miles.
“We think he’s better at the mile and a mile and an eighth is probably
stretching him out a little bit,” Lorieul said. “I know he won the other day at
that distance, but the Mile has got the pace scenario that I think is good for
him. As he gets older, the mile is probably his best distance.”
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