Havana, the morning-line favorite for Saturday’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile,
pleased trainer Todd Pletcher with his morning exercise on Wednesday, the day
after arriving from Belmont Park.
“He arrived very well and galloped good this morning,” Pletcher said. “He
sold out here at Barretts, so flown from Ocala to California before. I think
he’s used to traveling a bit.”
Havana enters the Juvenile off an impressive 5 1/2-furlong maiden score and a
front-running score in the one-mile Champagne at Belmont.
“The real question for him was going from the 5 1/2-furlong maiden to the
Champagne with only one start,” Pletcher said. “To be able to do that, it takes
a pretty special horse to do that. We were able to do that with Uncle Mo. There
are a lot of similarities to the way he’s come to this race and Uncle Mo.”
Should Havana win Saturday, he would follow in the footsteps of the
Pletcher-trained Uncle Mo (2010) and Shanghai Bobby (2012), both of whom were
undefeated juveniles who earned Eclipse Awards.
Pletcher expects that Havana will handle two turns for the first time in the
1 1/16-mile Juvenile as well as Uncle Mo and Shanghai Bobby did.
“He gives me the impression watching him train that he’ll get more distance,”
he said. “Sometimes the first time a horse runs around two turns, they run their
best. It’s not always the case, but I think it should work out well for him.”
Smarty’s Echo will give trainer Anne Smith her first Breeders’ Cup starter
when the son of Smarty Jones enters the starting gate for the Juvenile. The colt
had been pre-entered in the Juvenile Turf and Juvenile but will make his dirt
debut Saturday.
“We believe he’ll be a better horse on the dirt in the long run,” Smith said
as far as the decision to start in the richer of the two races. “His pedigree
says dirt and he trained quite a bit on the (dirt) training track at Arlington.”
Smarty’s Echo arrived at Santa Anita on Sunday after completing his serious
prep work with a five-furlong drill in 1:00 1/5 the previous day at Keeneland.
Since arriving he has been to the track the past several mornings for easy
gallops which is the plan heading into Saturday’s race.
“He’s been taking (the surroundings) all in and he was much looser and more
relaxed this morning, which is good,” she said. “He’s gotten a good feel for the
track and seems to be gaining confidence.”
Smith only has been training since November 2012 although she’s had her
license for a number of years. Before going out on her own, she had served as an
assistant to her now ex-husband Austin Smith and before that had worked with
Hall of Fame trainer Carl Nafzger and Ian Wilkes.
“I know that on paper or in other people’s eyes it may be a surprise that I
am here (in my first year as a trainer), but I’ve worked around horses all my
life. Working with top athletes is nothing new to me, whether with show horses
or Thoroughbreds. I learned a lot from Austin, Carl and Ian. I’ve been lucky to
have owners who have trusted me with nice horses to develop.”
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