Steve and Jean had an adventuresome trip up to Saratoga last Friday, to check out a possible claim for the Castle Village Farm 2010 Claiming Partnership. That partnership had lost its previous horse, Good Law, to a claim back in June, and we’d been looking for a replacement for nearly two months. With Castle Village Farm’s very rigorous criteria for making claims, and with the dearth of good claims available at the Belmont meet – compared to the claiming frenzy going on at Monmouth – Bruce and Steve were beginning to wonder if they’d ever find the right horse. Here’s Steve’s report:
Jean and I drove up to Saratoga for the race, since I don't like to make a claim without seeing the horse myself, no matter how many replays I've watched and how thoroughly I've studied the past performances. I trust Bruce's contacts -- and his judgment -- but there's just no substitute for that last look before dropping the claim. And besides, who can resist a trip to the Spa?
Of course, when the trip is there and back from New York City all in the same day, it’s not quite the relaxing vacation it would be if one went up for, say, a week. Three and a half hours each way does eat up a chunk of the day. And, if you’re planning on lunch or dinner along the way, without losing a huge chunk of time, the options are, to say the least, somewhat limited.
The horse we’d spotted in the past performances was Bishop of Nola, a New York-bred three-year-old by Devil His Due, running in a $25,000 claimer for horses that had never won two races. I don’t usually like to claim out of those N2L events, since the reason that a lot of horses are in them is that they have an aversion to winning, but the quality of the races at Saratoga has been well above what it was at Belmont, and Bishop of Nola was relatively lightly raced and had looked eager and competitive in the video replays that we’d watched.
Bruce and I were on the rail when the horses were coming into the paddock, and we both decided that Bishop of Nola looked just fine, although he had bell boots on his front feet (those little protective rubber thingies). That's sometimes a sign of a weak hoof, but he was wearing regular shoes with nails, and not the glue-ons that trainers sometimes use when a horse has hoof problems. And Bruce noted that Bishop of Nola’s trainer, Dominick Schettino, often used the bell boots, even when there were no foot problems.
So, Bruce dropped the claim slip, and then we watched while Bishop of Nola decided to misbehave in the paddock, bucking and rearing up, and showing a distinct unwillingness to let jockey Jose Espinoza get aboard. I was worried that the colt might get scratched then and there -- or that he was leaving his race right there. But Bruce didn't break a sweat. He just murmured something about how he’d have to give the horse a little more education. Eventually, Espinoza managed to stay on, and Bishop of Nola came out, well behind the rest of the horses in the post parade.
The Bishop tracked the early leader, Lion Under Oath, through the first three-quarters of a mile in a relatively easy 1:13.2, then took over the lead at the top of the stretch and picked up the pace, finishing in 23.5 seconds for the final full quarter and a very healthy 6 flat for the last 16th of a mile. He kept Lion Under Oath at bay, and was too quick for the late charges by Cullinan (also claimed out of the race) and Exclusive Strike. I don't have the Beyer figure yet, but Equibase, which produces speed figures for the track program, gave Bishop of Nola a 95, the best he's ever done. Looks like we claimed him just as he's getting to be a very good horse.
And we did claim him. To my surprise, we were the only ones to drop a claim on him, so there wasn’t even a shake to see who’d get him.
With yesterday's win, Bishop of Nola's record goes to 11-2-3-1, with earnings of just over $70,000.
Bishop of Nola came out of the race in good shape. Understandably, he was a little tired after that effort, but he was completely sound and walked the shedrow by the morning after the race.
Bruce plans to keep Bishop of Nola up at Saratoga, so they can get to know each other. Also, horses can be trained on the turf at Saratoga. Bruce expects that, if all goes well, we'll run Bishop of Nola back in a NY-bred N1X allowance before the end of the Saratoga meet.
It's definitely nice to have a horse again, and especially one we can have so much fun with. It almost made that long drive back to New York worth it -- even though, after the drive up and an exciting and exhausting, albeit successful day, it felt longer than ever.
And, to make the trip feel even longer to Steve, he had to drive the whole way home. Usually, Jean shares at least some of the driving, but they weren’t even to Malta when she fell asleep. To give her credit, she’d wake up every now and then, just enough to say, “I’ll drive if you get too tired,” and then she’d fall asleep again.
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