HORSE RACING : OAK TREE : Blacksburg Wins Volante Handicap

Trainer Wayne Lukas was surprised when he looked up at the tote board and saw Blacksburg was 10-1 about a dozen minutes before the start of the $112,700 Volante Handicap on Sunday at Santa Anita.

“I told (a reporter) he was as good as human hands can make him right now,” Lukas said.

The 3-year-old Seattle Slew gelding was good enough to win the Volante, using the same wire-to-wire tactics that led to victories in a division of the Oceanside and the La Jolla Handicap.

With Alex Solis aboard for the first time, Blacksburg opened up a lead of six lengths around the far turn, and although his margin was cut in the final furlong, he was never in serious danger. In winning for the seventh time in 20 starts, he completed the 1 1/8 miles over a turf course labeled “good” in 1:48. His backers had to settle for 6-1 and a $14.80 payoff.

Siberian Summer, a 20-1 shot, was second all the way. He wound up 1 1/4 lengths behind the winner and a half-length in front of 16-1 shot Star Recruit. Casual Lies was fourth in his second try on grass, and Major Impact, the lukewarm 3-1 favorite, was sixth in the field of 10.

After his consecutive victories at Del Mar, Blacksburg was fourth as the favorite in the Del Mar Derby, then was beaten by almost 31 lengths on the main track against older horses in the Budweiser Breeders’ Cup Handicap.

Lukas, who will leave this morning for Florida to oversee his stable’s Breeders’ Cup preparation, acknowledged that he shouldn’t have run the gelding a fourth time at Del Mar.

“I might have taken him to the well one too many times,” he said.

Kent Desormeaux had been Blacksburg’s rider in his last four races, but he rode Star Recruit on Sunday.

“Kent’s agent (Gene Short) said he’d made a couple of commitments (for the Volante) and he said he’d get back to me,” Lukas said. “I took that as meaning he was trying to get on another horse, so I went ahead and got Alex.

“I wasn’t concerned about the 1 1/8 miles. He worked so good and strong. I told Alex, ‘Just don’t let them up on you at the head of the stretch,’ and he skipped away at the right time.”

Solis has no desire to give up the mount when Blacksburg makes his next scheduled appearance in the Hollywood Derby on Nov. 22.

“Mr. Lukas told me to put him on the lead and take a long hold,” he said. “He has so much natural speed, he just went off on the lead by himself. At the three-eighths pole, he switched leads and I just asked him to go. He might have been a little tired, but he was still running at the end.”

A winner over the course 13 days earlier, Siberian Summer has improved since adding Lasix three races ago. He had bled when finishing ninth, nine lengths behind Daros, in the Del Mar Derby.

“My horse is the kind of horse that likes another horse with him,” Laffit Pincay said of the runner-up. “The leader was too far in front. Every time the horse that was outside of me came on, my horse went on. I wish it would have come sooner. I thought Blacksburg was going to come back, but he just kept on going. I was surprised.”

Gary Stevens, the rider of the favorite, said his colt didn’t care for the course.

“Everyone just stayed in the same position the whole way,” he said. “My horse simply didn’t handle the track. That was the story.”

Magical Maiden, winner of Saturday’s Linda Vista Breeders’ Cup Handicap, is set to be flown to Florida on Tuesday to run in the Breeders’ Cup Distaff at Gulfstream Park on Saturday.

“Everything’s on schedule,” trainer Warren Stute said. “She’ll leave Tuesday, and I plan to leave the same day. (Running her back in a week) is not the thing you’d do all the time, but on a one-shot basis, I see nothing wrong with it in this case.”

Race The Wild Wind, who finished last, beaten by 36 lengths, as the 9-10 favorite Saturday, simply didn’t care for the wet track.

“It was the deep, heavy track,” said Eduardo Inda, Ron McAnally’s assistant trainer. “I’m sure that’s what it was because she was just fine (Sunday) morning. She was up and about, feeling good.”

Horse Racing Notes

Bien Bien was fifth in the Volante, followed by Major Impact, White Blade, Smiling and Dancin, Turbulent Kris and River Majesty. . . . On a mandatory payout day in the Pick Nine, two tickets that had eight winners were worth $185,863.20. . . . Codified, a 2-year-old son of Lear Fan making his first start in the sixth race, quickly took the lead under Kent Desormeaux and went on to win by seven lengths. He covered the six furlongs in 1:12 2/5 over a very slow main track. Codified, out of the stakes-winning mare Past Forgetting, is owned and was bred by Georgia Ridder and is trained by David Hofmans. . . . Jeff Siegel and Mandy McKaughan will be hosts of a one-hour Breeders’ Cup Preview at 8:30 p.m. Friday on KDOC-TV (Channel 56).