LOS ALAMITOS : Trials for Dash for Cash Set Tonight

The trials for the Grade I Dash for Cash Derby will be held tonight at Los Alamitos with Newmont, the Los Alamitos Derby winner, and Ourautograph, the Laddie Handicap winner, heading the list of 18 entrants.

The 10 fastest qualifiers in tonight’s two trials will earn a spot in the final of the Dash for Cash Derby on June 24. That racing date will be the first Sunday afternoon program for Los Alamitos.

Owner Leonard Stein of Two Rock Ranch paid the $8,300 late fee to make Newmont eligible for the Dash for Cash Derby trials. Trained by Tom Bazley, Newmont scored a stunning upset in the Los Alamitos Derby on May 12, which was enough to prompt Stein and Bazley to take a shot at the Dash for Cash.

“We gave some thought to going to the Rainbow Derby (at Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico) with him, but we wound up staying closer to home,” Bazley said.

Newmont will be facing a tougher test in the Dash for Cash Derby. Several top 3-year-olds who passed on the Los Alamitos Derby will be coming out for this race, among them Ourautograph and Mighty Easy Pass.

Trained by Bob Baffert, Ourautograph won last year’s Kindergarten at Los Alamitos and recently won the Laddie Handicap in impressive fashion.

Like Newmont, Ourautograph almost passed on the Dash for Cash Derby in favor of the Rainbow Derby.

“We thought about it, but it cost $20,000 to pay in late to the Rainbow and that slowed us down,” Baffert said. “(Ourautograph is) doing great right now and I think he’ll win this derby.”

Drawing right next to Ourautograph in the second of the two Dash for Cash Derby trials is Mighty Easy Pass, last year’s Dash for Cash Futurity winner.

A daughter of Easy Jet, Mighty Easy Pass will be trying to become the fourth horse in the 10-year history of the Dash for Cash Derby to win sweep both the futurity and the derby.

Whereas Ourautograph seems to be at the top of his game, Mighty Easy Pass may be a race away from her best effort.

After her tough 1989 freshman campaign, Mighty Easy Pass was sent home to Utah, where bone chips were removed from her knee. In her first race after that surgery, the filly won a trial for the Kansas Derby at Ruidoso Downs but failed to go fast enough to qualify for the final.

“She’s only been here since June 7 so we’re cutting it pretty close for the trials,” said Carlos Lopez, who trains Mighty Easy Pass in California. “I’m just hoping she qualifies. If she does, we have 10 days before the final to get ready.”

The Dash for Cash Derby trials will be the eighth and ninth races on tonight’s program.

The controversy over Lasix, which seemed to be the dominant story of this year’s Belmont Stakes, has pretty much avoided Los Alamitos, but it seems that the use of the diuretic used to combat stress-induced bleeding from the lungs in thoroughbreds, is on the rise in quarter horse racing.

In last Saturday night’s $148,000 Vessels Maturity, seven of the 10 entrants were listed as having been treated with Lasix.

Although 70% of a quarter horse field may seem startling, veterinarian Nancy Goodman said the quality of the field may account for the high percentage of Lasix users.

“The better horses run faster and they run harder,” she said. “The harder and faster a horse runs, the more stress they put on their system and the more likely they are to bleed.

“I also feel that you see more bleeders among the older horses, which is why the Maturity (a race for 4-year-olds) may have had seven horses running on Lasix.”

In the $233,000 Kindergarten, for instance, a race for 2-year-olds held June 2 at Los Alamitos, only three of the 10 entrants raced on Lasix.

One horse in Saturday night’s Vessels Maturity racing without Lasix was the surprise winner, Jazzing Hi.

Sent off at 9-1, Jazzing Hi set a stakes record with his 21.41-second quarter-mile victory.

The victory in the Maturity was the first in a stakes for Jazzing Hi, although students of bloodlines, both human and horse, should not have been surprised.

Jazzing Hi is trained by Daryn Charlton, the nephew of former quarter horse trainer Wayne Charlton, who won the first Vessels Maturity in 1972 with the champion mare Charger Bar.

Besides having good human bloodlines on his side, Jazzing Hi is a son of the top stakes mare Anna Hi, for several years the holder of the Los Alamitos 870-yard track record.

With his victory in the Vessels Maturity, Jazzing Hi earned an invitation to the $250,000 Champion of Champions to be run next winter at Los Alamitos.

Trainer Bob Gilbert unleashed a promising young runner in the 2-year-old Copauino, who scored her first victory in Saturday night’s seventh race.

A striking, gray daughter of Beduino, Copauino turned in an overpowering display in her second start as she won by two lengths.

Owned by Jimmy and Elaine Coffman of Texas, Copauino is a half-sister to the stakes winner Packin Sixes and she may make her next start far away from Los Alamitos.

“I don’t know for sure, but I just may wait for the All American Futurity trials (in New Mexico) before I start this filly again,” Gilbert said. “She acts like a real nice filly and I wouldn’t want to hurt her before we get a chance at the big money.”

The $2.5-million All American Futurity is the richest event in quarter horse racing, with the final set for Labor Day.