OCEANPORT, N.J. – A local trainer stood by the rail at Monmouth Park as rain fell on the eve of today’s Breeders’ Cup and summed it up this way: “What a shame. After 23 straight days of perfect weather, we get this. You hate to let the track (condition) beat you on racing’s best day.”
The 24th running of the Breeders’ Cup World Championships – eight races worth $20 million in purses – will be the wettest one ever. Post time for the first race on Monmouth’s 11-race card is 11 a.m., with the first Breeders’ Cup event, the Juvenile Fillies, off at 12:30 p.m. The $5 million Classic, expected to determine Horse of the Year, is slated for 5:35 p.m. ESPN will broadcast the races from 12-7 p.m.
Track and turf conditions will play a determining role in the outcomes.
A steady drizzle fell through most of yesterday, with a downpour in late afternoon. A thunderstorm is forecast for this morning that could dump another inch of rain on the already swampy Jersey Shore oval, followed by gradual clearing.
“This is the worst kind of rain,” said Bob Juliano, Monmouth’s director of facilities. “It doesn’t drain off. It just lays there.”
The track, sloppy and sealed (to keep out moisture) for yesterday’s opening Breeders’ Cup races, is likely to remain so throughout today, Juliano said. He did hold out hope that, if the sun pokes through late in the day and the wind picks up, the condition could be upgraded to good or muddy for the Classic.
The turf course, downgraded yesterday to yielding, will be demoted even further today, to soft. There is a very remote possibility that, if the grass becomes dangerously soft, the Breeders’ Cup would be forced to shift its three grass races – the Filly & Mare Turf, Mile, and Turf – to the main track.
“The Breeders’ Cup will do everything to keep those races on turf,” one official said.
Whatever the weather, the show must go on. Racing is, after all, an outdoor sport. As always, the Breeders’ Cup will answer some major questions:
Who will be Horse of the Year? The 4-year-old Lawyer Ron (winner of the Whitney and Woodward) and 3-year-old Triple Crown rivals Street Sense (Kentucky Derby, Travers) and Curlin (Preakness, Jockey Club Gold Cup) are the three leading contenders for this honor and would clinch it with a victory.
But two other 3-year-olds – Any Given Saturday, coming off three straight stakes scores; and Derby runner-up Hard Spun, winner of the King’s Bishop and Kentucky Cup Classic (beating Street Sense) in his last two starts – could swing the momentum their way if they win.
Is Ireland’s Dylan Thomas the best horse in the world? The 4-year-old European champion has run in a Group 1 race every month since April, winning five of eight (with three seconds) including the Irish Champion Stakes and the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe. The Breeders’ Cup international handicapping committee rates him eight pounds better than any other horse in the mile-and-a-half Turf.
But no Arc winner has won the Turf in the same year, and Dylan Thomas, at the end of a long, hard campaign, prefers firmer ground.
Could Nashoba’s Key be the star of the show? This Cal-bred 4-year-old filly has the best record of any horse in the Breeders’ Cup – seven starts, seven wins, including a pair of Grade 1s. She puts her streak on the line in the Filly & Mare Turf, her first race outside California.