With Pincay in Spotlight, Turf Cup Has Star Appeal

Lazy Lode may have won last year’s Hollywood Turf Cup, but it will take a hot rider like Laffit Pincay to get trainer Richard Mandella’s horse home today in the 19th edition of the stake.

Since the 1998 Turf Cup, Lazy Lode has switched trainers, going from Wally Dollase to Mandella, and his only victory in his last eight starts came in the ungraded Jim Murray Memorial Handicap at Hollywood in June. Lazy Lode is 4-1 on the morning line for today’s seven-horse race, behind favored Yagli at 2-1, Public Purse at 5-2 and Single Empire at 7-2.

Pincay, who has been winning at a 25% clip at the Hollywood meet, was blanked on three mounts Friday. Including Lazy Lode, he will ride seven horses today in his pursuit of Bill Shoemaker’s career-win record. Pincay has won 8,829 races, four short of tying Shoemaker.

When Corey Nakatani won the Turf Cup on the lead with Lazy Lode last year, they beat Yagli, the 4-5 favorite, by 1 1/2 lengths. Only four of 19 favorites have won the stake, but Yagli will try to reverse that trend today. Like Lazy Lode, Yagli is also trying to right himself. Trainer Bill Mott’s 6-year-old began the year with some strong performances at Gulfstream Park, Belmont Park and Monmouth Park, winning three in a row. Since then he has been unable to get the firm ground he prefers and has lost three in a row, the most recent a fourth-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Turf at Gulfstream on Nov. 6.

Pincay, who’ll turn 53 Dec. 29, is riding Lazy Lode because Gary Stevens, the contract rider for Prince Ahmed Salman’s Thoroughbred Corp., is recovering from knee surgery. Asked this week if he might consider retirement after he breaks record, Pincay said:

“I’m enjoying riding more than I ever have in my life. I don’t know if I can ride one, two or three more years, but as long as I feel the way I do now, I’m going to keep on riding.”

Among Pincay’s other mounts today is Cavonnier, 4-1 on the morning line in the On Trust Handicap for California-breds. Cavonnier has won only once and run only three times since he suffered a tendon injury in the 1996 Belmont Stakes. Second in the ’96 Kentucky Derby when he was nosed out by Grindstone, Cavonnier was ridden for the first time by Pincay last month, when he finished fifth in the Skywalker Stakes at Santa Anita.

Pincay will ride six horses Sunday, including Early Pioneer in the $100,000 Vernon O. Underwood Stakes, which drew only five entrants. Early Pioneer has won six of 24 starts and has never won a stake.

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Horse-of-the-year ballots have been mailed, and the decision for the 264 voters will be no easier than it seemed in the immediate aftermath of Breeders’ Cup day at Gulfstream Park, where most of the leading contenders crashed. Cat Thief’s shocking win in the Classic dimmed the title hopes of horses such as Behrens, Almutawakel, Lemon Drop Kid, General Challenge and River Keen, who weren’t even close to the winner. The best finish by that group was the fifth by Almutawakel.

Silverbulletday, another horse-of-the-year contender, was also beaten on Breeders’ Cup day, as was another of trainer Bob Baffert’s star fillies, the previously undefeated Chilukki.

Unless the horse-of-the-year voters want to support a horse that finished the year on the downgrade, they will have to consider Breeders’ Cup winners Beautiful Pleasure, Daylami and Artax, or Charismatic and Victory Gallop, whose year was cut short because of injuries. Cat Thief, despite winning only two races all year, will probably still get some votes, on the basis that he did beat the best of the year’s survivors in the Classic.

The winner, to be announced Jan. 17 at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, inevitably will wind up with a small plurality, and the Eclipse Awards committee has announced a tiebreaking system should two or more horses finish even.

Of the voters, 55 are from the Daily Racing Form, 172 belong to the National Turf Writers Assn., and 34 are racing secretaries at tracks that belong to the National Thoroughbred Racing Assn. Under the Eclipse bloc-voting rules, a horse must get the most votes from at least two of the three groups to win. Under this system, it’s possible for a horse to win without getting the most votes, and discussions already have been held about switching to a total-votes plan for next year.

Horse Racing Notes

At the end of September, trainer Bob Frankel ranked 10th nationally with $3.4 million in purses. Since then, his barn has racked up $3.3 million and Frankel has vaulted into fourth place. Frankel, who won the Hollywood Turf Cup in 1997 with River Bay, takes his shot today with Public Purse, a French import that made his U.S. debut by winning the Carleton F. Burke Handicap at Santa Anita on Oct. 31. . . . With the sale of Caffe Latte by David Milch to Bob and Janice McNair, trainer Julio Canani has lost another stakes horse to Bob Baffert. The McNairs bought Tuzla from Milch this summer and transferred her to Baffert. Caffe Latte was fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf. . . . Russell Baze, who suffered a back injury Oct. 31, is expected to resume riding next Wednesday at Golden Gate Fields. Baze has run out of time in his bid to win 400 or more races for an eighth consecutive year. He had won 346 when he was injured. With 6,783 wins, Baze ranks eighth on the career list.