Hollywood Park : Alex Solis Counts on Dahar, Snow Chief to Snap His Long Winless Spell

In Saturday’s Silver Screen Handicap, Hollywood Park has the hot horse and the cold jockey.

The horse is Snow Chief, winner of the Preakness, the Florida, Santa Anita and Jersey derbies, the leading 3-year-old in the country and the earner of almost twice as much money ($1.7 million) as any other horse this year.

Snow Chief’s jockey is Alex Solis, still among the top 10 on the Daily Racing Form’s national money list with $3.6 million in purses but a rider who has all but dropped out of sight in the Hollywood Park jockey standings.

When Solis failed to win with six mounts Thursday, his losing streak at Hollywood Park reached 62 races. Earlier in the season, Solis went more than three weeks, and 59 races, without a win locally. Solis is winning with only 7% of his mounts, well below the 14% he had last year and the 11% he registered at Santa Anita, where he finished sixth in the standings with 44 wins.

Snow Chief, who’ll be an odds-on favorite against a possible 12 other 3-year-olds in the $400,000 Silver Screen, must look like a desert oasis to Solis, who hasn’t won a stake at Hollywood all season. Another horse Solis can’t wait to board is Dahar, who gave the 22-year-old Panamanian two major wins at Santa Anita. Dahar will be favored today in the $250,000 Sunset Handicap as Hollywood launches the Independence Day weekend.

Neither Carl Grinstead, the co-owner of Snow Chief with Ben Rochelle, nor Mel Stute, the trainer of the near-black California-bred colt, feels that Solis’ slump will compromise their horse’s chances Saturday. Stute, a three-time Hollywood training champion whose stable has also been struggling this summer, even takes the blame for some of Solis’ problems.

“Because of me (with Snow Chief and the filly Sari’s Heroine), Alex has gone out of town a lot to ride,” Stute said. “When a jockey does that, his business back home is bound to suffer. It even affected Chris McCarron to a certain extent when he took a lot of mounts in out-of-town stakes. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the way Alex is riding.”

McCarron, however, has come back strong and is in the thick of the battle, with Laffit Pincay and Gary Stevens, for the Hollywood riding title. Solis continues to struggle.

One race Solis couldn’t make this season was the Hollywood Invitational, run the same day that he rode Snow Chief to his $600,000 win in the Jersey Derby at Garden State Park. Dahar, with Bill Shoemaker riding, finished second by a neck to Flying Pidgeon, Shoemaker conceding that his horse would have been best with a better trip. Trainer Charlie Whittingham has given back the mount on Dahar to Solis in today’s Sunset, which will also include Flying Pidgeon.

Although the low win total doesn’t reflect it, Solis does not feel that he is riding poorly.

“I have had slumps before,” Solis said. “I just haven’t been riding the right horses and I’m sure things will come around. I’ve missed some good horses back here because of going to places like Kentucky, New Jersey and Maryland to ride.”

Recently, Solis changed agents, replacing Vince DeGregory with Joe Griffin. DeGregory, an established agent whose clients have included Angel Cordero in New York and Pincay and McCarron in California, had been finding mounts for Solis since the jockey’s arrival from Florida last year.

“There was too much fighting between me and Vince,” Solis said, explaining the change. “If I’m doing something wrong, then just tell me it is wrong and I will understand, but that was not the way it was going. Vince was also fighting with some of the trainers, and then they would get mad at me because of him. You get the trainers mad at you and then you lose them as customers.”

According to DeGregory, there were problems with only two trainers, Bobby Frankel and Mike Mitchell.

“Alex told me that Frankel and Mitchell didn’t want to use him because I was his agent,” DeGregory said. “I took Alex’s book last year and made him the fourth leading rider in the country at one point. Frankly, I think he’s had bad luck lately and has been overriding. But I hope he turns it around. I still like him.”

Solis occasionally replays the videotape of the Kentucky Derby, the only race Snow Chief has lost in his last eight starts. Not only did the 2-1 favorite lose, but he also faded from 4th to 11th, finishing almost 20 lengths behind the victorious Ferdinand.

Grinstead pinpoints Snow Chief’s failure in the Kentucky Derby as the attempt to keep pace with some of the fastest early fractions ever seen at Churchill Downs. The pace-setting Groovy finished last in the 16-horse field and the horses that tried to run with him early finished 11th, 12th and 14th.

Solis does not concede jockey error. “If we had been (farther) behind the leaders then they might have said that I was too far back,” he said. “I still don’t know why he lost. Horses are like people, they have bad days, and I think this was one of those days for this horse.”

Snow Chief has not had a bad day since. He won the Preakness by four lengths over Ferdinand; the margin in the Jersey Derby was two lengths over Mogambo.

Solis is unable to single out Snow Chief’s best race. “It might have been the Jersey Derby,” he said. “But he was very good in the Santa Anita Derby and the Preakness, too. In the Jersey Derby, he was very much the best and he did it very easily. I only had to hit him a couple of times.”

And now, lured by a purse that was originally only $100,000, Snow Chief is back at Hollywood Park, the track where:

--He ran his first two races, breaking his maiden as a first-time starter in June of last year.

--He won the $1-million Hollywood Futurity, which is the same mile distance as the Silver Screen, by 6 1/2 lengths last December.

On Thursday, Snow Chief finished preparations for the Silver Screen by blowing out a half-mile in :48 2/5. Alex Solis says the colt acts happy to be home. Solis is also happy that Snow Chief is here; he could be the key that unlocks the jockey’s season-long slump.

Horse Racing Notes Melair, the undefeated filly who won the Princess Stakes by 3 1/2 lengths on June 21, has been entered for the Silver Screen, but trainer John Sadler acts as though he’ll run against fillies, in Sunday’s $150,000 Hollywood Oaks. . . . The field for the Silver Screen, starting with the inside post, consists of Snow Chief, with Alex Solis riding, 127 pounds; Vernon Castle, Eddie Delahoussaye, 119 pounds; Buffalo Beau, Ray Sibille, 114; Grand Allegiance, Fernando Toro, 115; Prince Bobby B., Frank Olivares, 110; El Corazon, Terry Lipham, 116; Au Bon Marche, Luis Ortega, 114; Marvin’s Policy, Russell Baze, 116; He’s a Saros, Jack Kaenel, 112; Tripoli Shores, Chris McCarron, 112; Southern Halo, Laffit Pincay, 113; Buckland’s Halo, Gary Stevens, 111; and Melair, Pat Valenzuela, 114. . . . If all 13 start, He’s a Saros and Buckland Halo would be coupled for betting in the pari-mutuel field. . . . The track linemaker has made Snow Chief the 6-5 favorite, followed by Melair at 9-5 and Vernon Castle at 6-1.