Los Alamitos kicks off its seven-day winter thoroughbred meet Friday with an eight-race program that includes 56 entries (seven per race).
The Orange County track’s vice president, Jack Liebau, is optimistic the field sizes will hold steady throughout the abbreviated meet.
“So far entries have gone well,” Liebau said during a telephone interview Thursday. “Hopefully, I think it’s because I think our purses for the claiming ranks are equal to that of Santa Anita and Del Mar. I think, hopefully the second week, will be good because of the long layover (two weeks) before they go to Santa Anita.”
Track management would love for the meet to be longer, but their racing schedule was cut this year from eight to seven weeks.
“Unfortunately, we’re done racing on (Dec. 12), which is a real disappointment to all of us at Los Alamitos,” he said. “Here we are in December and there’s going to be no racing after Dec. 12.”
The meet includes three graded stakes – the $300,000 Grade I Starlet on Saturday, the $100,000 Grade III Bayakoa Stakes on Sunday and the $300,000 Grade II Los Alamitos Futurity on Dec. 11.
There are two ungraded stakes that will be run – the $100,000 Soviet Problem for fillies on Dec. 10 and the $100,000 King Glorious for colts and geldings on closing day.
Liebau believes the Futurity, which at one time was a Grade I race but was lowered to Grade II status a couple of years ago, will soon regain its Grade I status.
“We hope to get it back to a Grade I because we’ve raised the purse back from $200,000 to $300,000,” he said. “That race, it won’t be this time, but usually whoever wins (the Futurity) is the (early) favorite for the Kentucky Derby. But Corniche (not running in the Futurity) should be the odds-on favorite, I would assume now.”
The Southern California circuit will get a two-week break following this Los Alamitos meet. Santa Anita doesn’t begin its winter-spring meet until Dec. 26. Some in the industry view the pause in action as a positive, but Liebau doesn’t see it that way for three reasons:
• “From a racing point of view, people either get out of the habit of going to the races or going to the satellites and they find something else to do. I think that’s a danger,” he said.
• “If they continue to wager, they’re exposed to other circuits and they might continue to bet those circuits more frequently than they would otherwise if there wasn’t a break,” Liebau explained.
• “There’s no question that the breaks hurt labor. Unfortunately, it used to be a five-day race week, then we went to four and now we’re at three. So these jobs that over the years were really full-time jobs … it’s really tough on labor now,” he said. “It might be self-serving of me to say that, but labor is an important component of the industry and without it we’re out of luck. They say the horses need a break, well, the horses are still training. The horse doesn’t get a break from training.”
Six 2-year-old fillies were entered for the Starlet, a 1 1/16-mile race that began in 1981 at Hollywood Park.Trainer Bob Baffert has half the field, opting to enter Eda, 4 1/4-length winner of the Desi Arnaz Stakes at Del Mar on Nov. 13, Del Mar Debutante winner Grace Adler and Benedict Canyon.
Baffert has won the past four runnings of the Starlet, including last year’s upset victory with 17-1 shot Varda.
Baffert has won all seven runnings of the Futurity at Los Alamitos, also at 1 1/6 miles, beginning with Dortmund (2014), and continuing with Mor Spirit, Mastery, McKinzie, Improbable, Thousand Words and Spielberg.
Last year, Baffert won the Starlet and Futurity for the fourth consecutive year.
Liebau said there are no special COVID-19 protocols in place for the meet.
“We’ve got all the employees wearing masks,” he said. “Other than that, I don’t think there are any requirements as far as wearing masks outside.”
Follow Art Wilson on Twitter @Sham73
LOS ALAMITOS WINTER MEET
Facts regarding the Orange County track’s seven-day winter thoroughbred meet:
When: Friday through Sunday, Dec. 12.
Race days: Friday-Sunday opening week; Thursday-Sunday final week.
Post times: 1 p.m. weekdays; 12:30 p.m. weekends
Major races: $300,000 Grade I Starlet (Saturday), $300,000 Grade II Futurity (Dec. 11) and $100,000 Grade III Bayakoa Stakes (Sunday).
More info: 714 820-2800, or losalamitos.com
