More Good Options Than a New Orleans Menu

Saturday is the biggest day of the season at the Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots, with the $1 million Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby (G2) and the $400,000 Twinspires.com Fair Grounds Oaks (G2) heading a 14-race program that also includes the $400,000 New Orleans Handicap (G2) and the $300,000 Mervin Muniz Memorial Handicap (G2).

The Louisiana Derby and Fair Grounds Oaks respectively offer 170 qualifying points (100-40-20-10) to the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve (G1) and the Longines Kentucky Oaks (G1).

Elsewhere, a couple of graded stakes sprints on both coasts—the $200,000 Santa Monica Stakes (G2) for older fillies and mares at Santa Anita Park and the $100,000 Hutcheson Stakes (G3) for 3-year-olds at Gulfstream Park—are part of a "Cross Country Pick 4" that will be televised on Fox Sports Saturday At The Races from 4-6:30 pm Eastern on Fox Sports 2.

Fair Grounds Oaks (FG, race 10, 4:41 CT): The 2-3-4-5-6 finishers from the Rachel Alexandra (G2) five weeks ago will reconvene here, and the connections of all five will be glad that the winner, Monomoy Girl, is not here, because the latter is a neck away from a 5-for-5 record.

Classy Act (1) set a sharp pace and held off Wonder Godot (8) for second in the Rachel Alexandra, which came on the heels of back-to-back wins on turf and dirt coinciding with the addition of blinkers. Her three post-Rachel workouts include a bullet five furlongs, and last week a half-mile breeze that was third-fastest of 91 at the distance.

Wondor Godot and Patrona Margarita (5), third and fourth in the Rachel, are the lone graded stakes winners in the lineup.

The intriguing new face is Eskimo Kisses (4), who emerges from wins over maidens and first-level allowance fillies at Oaklawn Park. She made up better than five lengths through the last furlong to get up at the wire for the maiden win, and handled the class rise auspiciously in the slop three weeks later, waiting patiently behind the leaders around the far turn before slipping through on the rail to win off by nearly a dozen lengths. She is rampantly improving, and at this time of year especially, those types of 3-year-olds are dangerous despite their lack of stakes seasoning.

A - 1, 4

B - 5, 8

Louisiana Derby (FG, race 11, 5:21 CT): The top three finishers from the Risen Star Presented By Lamarque Ford (G2)—Bravazo (1), Snapper Sinclair (7) and Noble Indy (2)—square off again, and in all likelihood it is Noble Indy who will be favored come post time. This despite the fact that My Boy Jack (9), the winner of the Southwest Stakes (G3), is the 5-2 morning-line choice.

Bravazo (21-1) and Snapper Sinclair (41-1) were boxcar odds when separated by a nostril in the Risen Star, with Noble Indy two lengths behind. However, the latter had run only twice previously, beating maidens and preliminary allowance horses at Gulfstream, while the top two had each run in stakes repeatedly.

Noble Indy found himself down along the rail through the stretch, and galloped out with good energy. His trainer, Todd Pletcher, who already has two serious Kentucky Derby hopefuls in Audible and Magnum Moon, is putting blinkers on Noble Indy this time. 

Retirement Fund (5) has a development pattern very similar to that of Noble Indy—two wins to start his career, followed by a try in the Southwest—and is worth a look at double-digit odds. The saying goes that horses aren't always as good as they might look in victory, nor are they as bad as they might look in defeat. This may be apropos to the Southwest, in which Retirement Fund raced wide early, and was then shuffled back behind and between horses on the far turn, while My Boy Jack enjoyed clear sailing along a muddy rail that was the best place to be at Oaklawn Feb. 19.

Retirement Fund returns to the Fair Grounds, where he is 2 for 2, and may give a better account of himself for Steve Asmussen. 

Asmussen also saddles Snapper Sinclair, who gets a major rider change to Eclipse Award winner Jose Ortiz.

A - 2, 5

B - 1, 7

C - 9

Santa Monica (SA, race 5, 2 PT): This seven-furlong tilt drew only five, but you can make a case for or against four of them, and it's worth noting that the group is a collective 0 for 7 at the distance.

Indeed, even-money favorite Paradise Woods (3) is a dual grade 1 winner, but she was at her best last year when given free rein on the lead in the Santa Anita Oaks (G1) and the Zenyatta Stakes (G1) around two turns.

Meanwhile, 5-2 second choice Skye Diamonds (4) gets a rematch with Selcourt (5) after finishing a close third behind the latter in the Las Flores Stakes (G3) at six furlongs. On the one hand, Skye Diamonds could move up off that race, which was her first since running fourth in the Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint (G1); but on the other hand, Selcourt was involved in a race-long dispute with runner-up Coniah in the Las Flores, and Skye Diamonds had dead aim on them the length of the stretch and could not get by either one.

Perhaps there could be some value with Marley's Freedom (1), who is back home after a fruitless trip to Gulfstream for the Hurricane Bertie (G3), in which she stumbled at the start and was off last of 12 as the 2-1 second choice, before passing six horses late.

Prior to that, Marley's Freedom wound up finishing two lengths behind Paradise Woods in the La Brea (G1) under rather indecisive handling, dueling for the early lead toward the inside, dropping back, and swinging out four wide in an attempt to rebid and neglecting to change leads. Her five-furlong bullet work Mar. 13 was fastest of 106 that morning.

A - 1, 5

B - 3, 4

Hutcheson (GP, race 12, 5:44 ET): Another short field, which, along with the Santa Monica, keeps the x-country pick four manageable for bettors on a shoestring, at least in theory.

I freely admit to lacking any solid convictions about this sextet, other than the fact that Impact Player (1), the 9-5 favorite, got away with the easiest of leads through a slow pace when last seen more than two months ago, and that Tricks to Doo (4), the 2-1 second choice, should find this to be an easier assignment than the Swale Stakes (G3), in which he chased Strike Power, the subsequent second-place finisher in the Xpressbet.com Fountain of Youth (G2).

Tricks to Doo should benefit from the cutback to six furlongs (he is the only two-time winner at the distance), and may wind up in the garden spot drawn outside Impact Player and Belle Tapisserie (2), who, at least on paper, seem likely to hook up in an early dispute for the lead.

Soutache (6), whose $405,000 in earnings are nearly twice the rest of the field combined, makes his first start since winning a pair of Florida Stallion events over the track last September. The first of those came at the expense of World of Trouble, who then won the Pasco Stakes by almost 14 lengths, before running a close third in the Tampa Bay Derby (G2).

A - 4

B - 1, 2, 6