LOS ALAMITOS : Go Man Go Handicap May Not Go

The big question around Los Alamitos isn’t which horse will win the $50,000 Go Man Go Handicap on Saturday night. Dashing Val is the strong favorite to win the Grade I event.

The question is whether there will even be a Go Man Go Handicap on Saturday night.

A shortage of quality older horses has been a problem during the current quarter horse season, and that shortage was never more evident than when the nomination list for the Go Man Go was published.

The Go Man Go has been a mainstay on the summer stakes schedule since the first running of the race in 1960, but this year only eight horses were nominated, and it looks as if only three will run.

What makes the Go Man Go picture even more uncertain is the fact that those three all are trained by Blane Schvaneveldt.

A three-horse race worth $50,000 with all three horses trained by one man is hardly a race track’s dream, so there is a good chance that when the entries are counted Thursday morning, the Go Man Go Handicap will be scratched from the summer stakes schedule for the first time in 30 years.

“I’m going to enter all three of my horses if that’s what it takes to make the race go,” said Schvaneveldt, who is also the owner of the race favorite Dashing Val. “It’s tough to run an old horse around here right now. It seems that the best you can do is get five horses in a race.”

If the Go Man Go Handicap is canceled, it figures to hit Schvaneveldt’s bank account the hardest. Dashing Val would go into the race as an overwhelming favorite, thanks to his two earlier Los Alamitos stakes victories, in the Kaweah Bar Handicap and the Shue Fly Handicap.

A handsome 5-year-old son of Dash For Cash, Dashing Val is considered the top older horse on the grounds, and the Go Man Go was one of the main targets for the Schvaneveldt standard bearer.

“He’d have to die between now and Saturday for me not to run him in the Go Man Go,” Schvaneveldt said. “The main thing I ever learned from Lukas (former quarter horse trainer and now thoroughbred trainer Wayne Lukas) is that you run these horses when they’re hot. Get the money while you can get the money.”

Unfortunately for Schvaneveldt, if there is no Go Man Go on Saturday night, there won’t be any money to get.

One race that does figure to go this weekend is the $20,000 Endurance Handicap on Friday night.

This 870-yard stakes will feature the gelding Sables Defender, the leading distance runner on the West Coast right now and a winner of the War Chic Handicap on April 28 at Los Alamitos.

It was thought that the Endurance Handicap might prove to be the setting for the first meeting between Sables Defender and Hilco Scamper, last year’s distance star. But trainer Carol Proctor says she will wait for another time to send Hilco Scamper out for that meeting.

“We’re just not ready with Hilco Scamper right now,” she said. “When we meet Sables Defender, we want to be 100%, and he’s just not there right now.”

Hilco Scamper benefited the most from the recent change in state law that now allows thoroughbreds and quarter horses to race against one another at the distance of 870 yards.

Last year, the thoroughbred Hilco Scamper was without a doubt the top distance runner in the quarter horse sport, his 1989 record showing six stakes victories and $119,000 in earnings.

Without Hilco Scamper in the race, Sables Defender looks to be a big favorite in the Endurance, even though the gelding must carry top weight of 126 pounds.

Although the larger stables of such men as Schvaneveldt, Bob Baffert and Caesar Dominguez seem to be more and more dominating at Los Alamitos, last Saturday’s $119,000 Los Alamitos Derby proved to be a victory for one of the “little guys.”

Trainer Tom Bazley, who has labored in near obscurity with his 15-horse stable for most of the last 10 years, stepped into the spotlight when his Newmont, a 36-1 shot, turned in a stunning upset in the meet’s first Grade I event.

Anaheim residents, Bazley and his wife Clare work together during the long hours of training and both are hoping that the victory will bring a few more horses to their stable.

“It would be nice to see some more horses around here,” Tom Bazley said. “I’ve got one owner with seven horses and she’s selling out, so it looks like I’m losing half my stable.”

Bazley has been knocking on the door of a major win for the last few years, but seconds and thirds in stakes don’t draw the attention of new owners. It takes a major victory, and the 35-year-old trainer is hoping that Newmont’s big win was it.

“It was really pretty lucky that we even ran in the Derby trials,” Bazley said. “I was looking to run Newmont in an allowance race, but when none of those races filled, we went ahead and ran him in the trials. We were hoping to light the board in the finals. We really didn’t figure we’d light the top of the board.”

Bazley will now aim Newmont at the $25,000 Laddie Handicap on May 26. If the gelding is impressive in that race, he may be sent to Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico for the $400,000 Rainbow Derby.