Weekend Racing at Santa Anita : If the Track Is Muddy, Alysheba Won’t Run Sunday

The worst race of Alysheba’s career was when he lost by more than 20 lengths to Java Gold in the Travers last August. That Saratoga stake was run more in a mud slide than on a track, and Alysheba’s debut as a 4-year-old, scheduled for Sunday at Santa Anita, will be delayed if conditions are the same.

Alysheba has never won in the mud, and with the weather forecast calling for rain most of the weekend, it’s likely that there will be an off track for the $200,000 San Fernando Stakes.

Trainer Jack Van Berg has done it before, having kept last year’s Kentucky Derby winner in the barn in November when the Goodwood Handicap was run at Santa Anita.

Alysheba isn’t the only 4-year-old who’s doubtful for the San Fernando, the 1 1/8-mile middle leg of the series that started with the Malibu Dec. 26 and ends with the Charles H. Strub Stakes Feb. 7.

Temperate Sil, who was second, 7 1/2 lengths behind On the Line in the Malibu, also will be scratched if there’s mud Sunday, and Masterful Advocate could run today instead of Sunday, in a one-mile allowance race worth $55,000.

Eight horses are entered for the San Fernando. The lineup: Hot and Smoggy, with Alex Solis riding, 120 pounds; Tertiary Zone, Fernando Toro, 123; Candi’s Gold, Gary Stevens, 123; Alysheba, Chris McCarron, 126; Temperate Sil, Bill Shoemaker, 126; On the Line, Jose Santos, 120; Grand Vizier, Rafael Meza, 114, and Masterful Advocate, Jorge Velasquez, 123.

Besides On the Line and Temperate Sil, Candi’s Gold, Masterful Advocate, and Hot and Smoggy also ran in the Malibu, finishing third, seventh and eighth, respectively. More recently, Hot and Smoggy lost by a neck to Conquering Hero on the grass in the San Gabriel Handicap on Jan. 3.

Only five horses--Round Table, Hillsdale, Ancient Title, Spectacular Bid and Precisionist--have swept the three races in the Strub series, and no one is likely to win all three this season. On the Line was good enough in the seven-furlong Malibu, but he’s considered a miler and even Sunday’s distance might be too far for him. The Strub is 1 miles.

If he runs, Alysheba will be making his first start since he missed catching Ferdinand at the wire in the $3-million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Hollywood Park on Nov. 21.

Despite that second-place finish, the Classic did two things for Alysheba--it clinched the Eclipse Award vote for 1987’s best 3-year-old colt and it left him with earnings for the year of $2.5 million, more than any horse in the country.

Training superbly since the Classic, Alysheba worked a half-mile Friday in :48 2/5, with McCarron in the saddle. Van Berg clocked his horse in an excellent 11 seconds for the last eighth of a mile.

Despite career earnings of $2.8 million, Alysheba has won only four races--five if you count the Blue Grass Stakes in which he was disqualified for interference--and he’s never won at Santa Anita. As a 2-year-old, he ran third there in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, and last year he was fourth in an allowance race and second in the San Felipe Handicap, a race that proved to Van Berg that the colt needed minor throat surgery to correct a breathing problem.

The San Felipe was also one of Alysheba’s three starts on an off track. Besides his sixth-place finish as the favorite in the Travers, he was also second at Turfway Park in Kentucky in the fourth race of his career.

Horse Racing Notes Jose Santos, the New York-based jockey who totaled $12.3 million in purses in 1987 to beat out Pat Day by about $7,900 and lead the country for the second straight year, will also ride at Santa Anita on Monday. He has the mount on Top Corsage in the San Gorgonio Handicap. . . . In today’s stake, for older fillies and mares, Pine Tree Lane is top-weighted at 121 pounds for the seven-furlong Santa Monica Handicap. Pine Tree Lane finished third in the Eclipse voting, behind Groovy and Very Subtle, for best sprinter. . . . Tertiary Zone is an upset possibility in the San Fernando if it rains, since he won on an off track in New York last year when the Lawrence Realization was moved from the turf to the dirt. . . . Equipment changes call for Candi’s Gold to run without blinkers and Masterful Advocate to run with them. . . . Chart the Stars, who beat Alysheba in the San Felipe, is coming back from a leg injury and is close to starting after working a mile in 1:39 4/5 Friday. . . . Although Nelson Bunker Hunt had a dispersal sale that brought $46.9 million in Kentucky last week, he still owns 70 or 80 horses of racing age, many of them with trainer Charlie Whittingham. . . . San Fernando entrants Grand Vizier and Hot and Smoggy were both obtained by their owners through the claiming ranks.