Wooden Injun Leads Trainer Garcia’s Parade to Pimlico

The “loaded” barn of trainer Carlos Garcia will be in business as usual Thursday when the 70-day spring meeting begins at Pimlico Race Course.

Garcia, second most successful trainer in the Laurel meet that ended Tuesday, will saddle the short-priced favorite, Wooden Injun, in the $60,000 Mister Diz Stakes. The race is a six-furlong sprint for Maryland-bred 3-year-olds.

The colt, bred by owner David Hayden, is among the strong candidates Garcia is training in several categories of young horses.

Wooden Injun has won his two starts, both stakes, as a 3-year-old. He had two victories, a second and a third in four starts at age 2.

In his last start, Wooden Injun nosed out his stablemate, Ebonizer, in the Dancing Count Stakes on Feb. 3.

Wooden Injun is by Baederwood, sire of stakes winners Bea Quality and Miracle Wood. His dam, Barrera’s Charm, is a daughter of Barrera, one of the fastest sprinters who ever came out of the West.

A son of Raise A Native, named for trainer Laz Barrera by breeder Louis Wolfson, Barrera broke track records on both coasts. His 1:07 2-5 in the 1977 Premiere Handicap was still the record for six furlongs when the Hollywood Park course was altered for the 1984 Breeders’ Cup. In 1978, at 5, Barrera won the Tobbogan at Aqueduct in 1:08 4-5, a track record.

Wooden Injun first attracted attention last Aug. 25, when he ran away by 17 lengths in a six-furlong race at Laurel. He led by 10 at the eighth pole and Kent Desormeaux could have gotten him home sooner than his 1:11 clocking if necessary.

(Possibly topping that, Garcia has a 3-year-old filly who won her first start last Saturday by 18 lengths. Pretty Flame, by the good sprinter Mt. Livermore, went the 6 1/2 furlongs in 1:17 4-5, a second faster than allowance horses had done it two races earlier.)

One of Wooden Injun’s defeats was by Smelly, a Maryland-bred who will head the field for the $200,000 Federico Tesio at Pimlico Saturday. Smelly left Wooden Injun seven lengths behind in the seven-furlong Bimelech.

Smelly was a strong second in Gulfstream’s Fountain of Youth on March 3. He may be Maryland’s only Triple Crown contender, though trainer Charles Peoples has hopes for Baron De Vaux, who won the 1 1-16-mile Private Terms at Laurel the same day.

The 1 1-16-mile Tesio will include a tempting long shot. Trainer Mert Bailes, who almost never asks too much of his horses, is entering J.R.’s Horizon, who is eligible for non-winners of two other than maiden.

The son of Jim Ryan’s Belmont winner Caveat, J.R.’s Horizon won a 1 1-16-mile allowance last Friday. In similar races in his previous two starts he was second to Baron De Vaux by three quarters and to Gala Swinger by a head.

It took J.R.’s Horizon three months and six races to break his maiden, but lately he seems to be getting the idea. Anyway, he has given Bailes an idea.