American Pharoah Has Final Work for Haskell
Image:
Description:
American Pharoah's final workout for the William Hill Haskell Invitational (gr. I) appeared intentionally easy July 28 at Del Mar, with the Triple Crown champion recording a :48 4/5 breeze underneath overcast skies.
With owner Ahmed Zayat and his wife, Joanne, in attendance, and escorted out by assistant trainer Jimmy Barnes aboard his pony, Sunny, the Pioneerof the Nile colt ran furlong fractions in :12 3/5, :25 1/5, and :37 flat, and galloped out to five furlongs in 1:01 flat and six in 1:14 2/5 under regular workout rider Martin Garcia.
"I can't be next to you," Zayat told trainer Bob Baffert before the drill. "Makes me too nervous."
The colt earned a spattering of applause from the few hundred in attendance on a dark racing day at Del Mar, which former California Horse Racing Board member David Israel declared was "more than opening day at Hollywood Park."
His time for four furlongs was the 15th fastest of 44 workers at the distance Tuesday—with Jerry Hollendorfer-trained Perfect Set earning the bullet at :47 1/5—but it came with the rare "breezing" tag from Del Mar's clockers.
"(It was) his usual good work," clocker Dane Nelson said. "He went nice and easy with it."
Since training opened at Del Mar July 11, only four horses out of 1,990 individual workers have been given the "breezing" tag, including American Pharoah. The rest have been tagged with "handily."
"It's more about keeping him happy," Baffert said of American Pharoah's third timed workout at Del Mar in 10 days. "He'll be ready for anything that gets thrown at him."
BALAN: American Pharoah Wows in Del Mar Work
According to the trainer, American Pharoah has been easy to manage post Triple Crown, which helps but doesn't entirely quell his connections' nerves.
"Of all my horses, he's handled it (best)," Baffert said. "Point Given came out of (the Triple Crown) pretty good, but this guy has been pretty solid the whole way. ... Pharoah is easy to manage. These other ones are hard, just getting 2-year-olds going. We work Pharoah, and we won't even discuss him the rest of the day."
The colt will begin his journey to Monmouth Park July 29, with his flight arriving at New Jersey's Atlantic City International Airport at 2 p.m. ET. After the Aug. 2 Haskell, Baffert said American Pharoah will head back to Del Mar either Aug. 3 or Aug. 4, but the conditioner would not comment on further racing plans.
"We'll assess him after (the Haskell), but right now we're not talking about that," Baffert said. "We're going to do one race at a time and hone in on that one."