Round Six

After all the hype, tomorrow is the big day. It will be the Showdown in Stanton (where Delaware Park is located), Rumble in the DelCap, the West vs East. Lets meet the field for the 2011 Delaware Handicap!


Delaware Park - July 16, 2011
Race 10 - 5:18 PM 
Delaware H. (Grade II)
Purse $750,000. For Fillies And Mares Three Years Old And Upward. . One And One Fourth Miles. 

PP Horse Jockey Wgt Trainer
1 Life At Ten (KY) D Cohen 115 T A Pletcher
2 Thundering Emilia (KY) J Pimentel 111 M R Matz
3 Havre de Grace (KY) R A Dominguez 124 J L Jones
4 Love's Blush (MD) T L Dunkelberger 112 R Jenkins
5 Blind Luck (KY) G K Gomez 122 J Hollendorfer


First off the bat, Thundering Emilia is more then likely the better of the two longshots in this race. Love's Brush IMO will be the backmarker after BL makes her move in the stretch. So now that is out of the way, the question will be will the real Life at Ten show up, or is she done? Since her BC fiesco, she really has not been the same horse. The weather tomorrow is supposed to be good, so that might help her. The other thing that will help is that she is basically going to be the lone speed and she's won at this distance and track before. The problem is so has Blind Luck. She's finally rounding back into form with a win in the Vanity for her 6th Grade 1 of her career. She gets Garrett Gomez on her who has ridden her before and won this race back in 2008 with Hystericalady. Which leads us to the hometown favorite Havre de Grace. Not only is she coming off a win in the Obeah, the record for that race is pretty good. 3 out of the past 4 years, the winner of the Obeah has gone on to finish in the top 3 for the DelCap (only Peak's Maria Way did not finishing fourth, but runner-up Unbridled Belle won the race). She has a former leading rider at Delaware in Ramon Dominguez on her back, he who also has won this race in 2007 with Unbridled Belle.


So who is my pick? I gotta with my heart and go with Saint Liam's best foal and Pollard's Vision's best foal neck and neck for the wire. I'm going with Havre de Grace for the win, Blind Luck for second and Life at Ten showing her class to finish third.


I'm really excited to see Grace and BL as I have not seen them before. I will be having pictures (paddock possible, but since DelCap day is always busy, but def. track level for DelCap)!