DEL MAR : Frankel Coast-to-Coast Success

While trainer Bobby Frankel supervises his stable at Del Mar, he monitors the weather in the East.

“It’s raining in Saratoga,” Frankel said Friday morning at his barn. “They’ll probably take the race (Friday’s $100,000 Daryl’s Joy Stakes) off the grass and run it on the dirt. But that’s all right. I’ve got a horse (Now Listen) in there who likes either grass or dirt.”

As it turned out, the race was taken off the grass, which made Now Listen’s assignment easier because six of the 11 entrants were scratched. And Frankel was right about Now Listen’s versatility as he splashed to victory.

With more than $3.2 million in purses, Frankel ranks fourth nationally, behind Del Mar-based Wayne Lukas, Ron McAnally and Gary Jones, and he has stayed near the top by racing on both coasts.

Frankel won five major races at Belmont Park while winning four stakes at Hollywood Park and the strategy won’t change now while he’s at Del Mar. A week from today, he will run Digression in the $500,000 Iselin Handicap at Monmouth Park, Quest For Fame in the $250,000 Sword Dancer Handicap at Saratoga and Missionary Ridge in the $125,000 San Diego Handicap at Del Mar.

Frankel will be at Saratoga to saddle Quest For Fame, but before he leaves California, the former New Yorker will try to win the Palomar Handicap for the fourth time when Danzante faces nine opponents here today.

“Where the horses go depends on where they fit better, and the style of the races,” Frankel said. “Quest For Fame won at Hollywood Park (in the Hollywood Turf Handicap), but he really prefers softer ground. The Eddie Read (Handicap on Aug. 16) is too short (at 1 1/8 miles) for him. Also, I like to move the Juddmonte horses around so they’re not running against each other that much.”

There’s another Juddmonte Farm filly, Super Staff, entered in the Palomar, but she is trained by McAnally. Juddmonte, owned by Khalid Abdullah, the Saudi Arabian prince, approached Frankel last year to become the farm’s principal trainer in the United States, and he quickly accepted.

“Training for Juddmonte may be the best job in America,” said Frankel, whose blunt, outspoken style has led to an on-again, off-again relationship with some of his clients. Edmund Gann of San Diego has been in and out of business with Frankel, but there the trainer was Friday, saddling Gann’s Luthier Enchanteur for a three-quarter-length victory in the Wickerr Handicap.

“This guy is firing me all the time,” Gann said. “You know what we call him, don’t you? Steinbrenner. He’s another (George) Steinbrenner.”

A race named after Wickerr evokes memories for both Gann and Frankel, who teamed to win four stakes here with the gelding in 1981-82, including the Eddie Read both years. Wickerr, claimed by Frankel for $40,000, is the only horse to win the Read twice, and only one horse has won more stakes in the history of the track. How Now, racing for trainer Cecil Jolley from 1957 through 1960, won five stakes.

“Wickerr beat some good horses,” Frankel said. “He beat Perrault and The Bart. Then he got a bowel problem, and they had to operate on him and his career was over. He’s still around, at the farm. Best claim I ever made? I claimed a horse named Barometer for $15,000, and he won the Suburban (Handicap at Aqueduct in 1970).”

Wickerr was a watershed horse for Frankel at Del Mar, a sign that his days as a scrambler were ending. Frankel was a five-time training champion here, including four consecutive titles starting in 1975, but he was mostly trafficking in claiming stock then.

The 1980s brought no additional Del Mar titles, but five of Frankel’s 26 career stakes victories at Del Mar have come since 1981. When the season ended last year, he was the only trainer on the grounds with four stakes victories.

The collection of stakes winners in Frankel’s Del Mar barn now includes one who never will race again. Exbourne, first in five of eight starts last year and winner of the Hollywood Turf Handicap, was stricken with a circulatory hoof disease and his condition had been grave.

Friday, however, Frankel had a positive update. “He shipped down here with the other horses and did all right,” the trainer said. “There’s a chance he’ll make it. He’s not in any pain. Now the vets are saying that they think he’ll grow a new (hoof). But it’s still touch and go.”

Horse Racing Notes

Best Dress, giving Pat Valenzuela his third victory of the day, overtook Abundance Of Grace in the stretch and scored a three-quarter-length victory in the $81,600 Junior Miss Stakes. Slightly favored over the entry of Abundance Of Grace and Fleet Anna, Best Dress paid $6 and ran six furlongs in 1:10 4/5.

Forest Glow will carry high weight of 121 pounds and break from the No. 5 post against 10 other sprinters Sunday in the $100,000 Bing Crosby Handicap at Del Mar. Others entered in the six-furlong stake are Letthebighossroll, Sunny Blossom, Robyn Dancer, Southern Justice, Thirty Slews, Mate Bueno, Scherando, Slerp, Anjiz and Mystery Edge. . . . Del Mar donates $250 to the Don MacBeth Memorial Jockey Fund every time a jockey rides three winners in a day at the meeting, and there have been contributions all three days. Kent Desormeaux won three races on opening day, Alex Solis had a triple Thursday, and both Gary Stevens and Valenzuela won three races Friday. Stevens won the third, fourth and fifth, Valenzuela the sixth, seventh and eighth. . . . In Sunday’s $500,000 Haskell Invitational at Monmouth Park, Saint Ballado, with Julie Krone riding, is the 5-2 favorite in a 10-horse field. Dance Floor, the 121-pound high weight, is 3-1 with Stevens aboard. Technology is 5-1, and also entered is Binalong, with Corey Nakatani.