HOLLYWOOD PARK : Jockeys Start Fast Before Suspensions

Corey Nakatani and Fernando Valenzuela, who will begin five-day suspensions this weekend, were in the forefront Wednesday as Hollywood Park opened a 34-day season.

Nakatani, who rode his first winner at Caliente on Oct. 2, 1988, rode his 1,000th winner when Its Beer Thirty, a 5-year-old gelding, coasted home in the last race.

Valenzuela, who also broke in at Caliente, a year before Nakatani did, rode three winners, including a 2 3/4-length victory astride Artica in the $50,900 Jim Hill Stakes.

Nakatani, 24, begins his suspension Friday. It stems from a ride on Eagle Eyed in the Del Mar Derby. Nakatani appealed the suspension but now has decided to drop the appeal.

Valenzuela’s fast start at the Hollywood meet will lose momentum Saturday, when he begins a suspension for failure to maintain a straight course with Velvet Tulip, a horse that won on the closing day of the Oak Tree meet at Santa Anita on Monday. Velvet Tulip was disqualified to second place.

Nakatani is one of the hottest riders in the country. He won 51 races at Del Mar to take that title and had 30 victories to finish first at Oak Tree. Nakatani didn’t win any Breeders’ Cup races at Churchill Downs, but all four of his mounts ran well, starting with Serena’s Song’s loss by a head to Flanders in the Juvenile Fillies. Nakatani’s other three mounts--Dramatic Gold, third in the Classic; Miss Dominique, third in the Distaff; and Harlan, fourth in the Sprint--combined with Serena’s Song for $736,000 in purses.

Nakatani ranks seventh on the national money list with purses of $8.8 million, which is about $700,000 more than he totaled last year. Still to come is an assignment on Sandpit, the Oak Tree Invitational winner, in the world’s richest thoroughbred race, the $3.8-million Japan Cup, in Tokyo on Nov. 27.

Valenzuela made the most of his six mounts Wednesday. Besides his victory aboard Artica, he won two races for trainer Vladimir Cerin and finished second in another race.

Valenzuela has ridden Artica, a 2-year-old daughter of Canadian turf champion Frosty The Snowman, in all six of her races. It was the filly’s first on grass and came after she had broken her maiden at a mile at Santa Anita on Oct. 30.

“(Trainer) Mike Harrington told me this filly was really bred for the grass,” Valenzuela said. “And I knew she was improving. That last win, she really felt good and finished strongly. One of the most important things is that she’s relaxing a lot better, and it is sure making a difference.”

Artica, who paid $15.20 and ran a mile in 1:37 4/5, came from fourth place and passed the leader, Favored One, with about a sixteenth of a mile to go. Favored One protected second place, two lengths ahead of Royal Vale, with Nakatani’s mount, the 3-2 favorite Wilga, fourth in a six-horse field.

Before breaking her maiden, Artica had some dull races, including two seventh-place finishes in September at Del Mar and Fairplex Park.

“She had never set foot on a turf course until (Wednesday’s) race,” Harrington said. “But her dad held the world record going a mile and an eighth on turf, so there was no doubt in my mind that she’d run on turf.”

Harrington is considering paying a $10,000 supplement to make Artica eligible for the $200,000 Miesque, another mile race, on Nov. 26.

“Last year I nominated a bunch of 2-year-olds, and none of them made it,” Harrington said. “So this time I thought, why waste the money?”

The on-track crowd of 11,012 was more than 1,000 less than last year, but betting was up slightly and overall the handle of $6.8 million was almost 25% higher than 1993’s opener. To emphasize betting on Bay Meadows, Hollywood interspersed the races from the Northern California track in its daily program.

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When Hollywood Wildcat finished seventh as the 9-5 favorite in the Breeders’ Cup Distaff, it was her worst finish since April of 1993. The 4-year-old filly had never been farther back than third in 11 starts.

Trainer Neil Drysdale had been concerned all week at Churchill Downs about how Hollywood Wildcat would handle the track, and apparently that was her undoing. Last year’s Distaff winner and Eclipse Award champion came out of the race in good shape and was jogging at Hollywood Park on Wednesday.

Drysdale has his eye on the $400,000 Matriarch, a 1 1/8-mile grass race, on Nov. 27. Hollywood Wildcat ran that distance twice on the Hollywood Park turf course this summer, winning the Gamely Handicap and finishing second to Corrazona in the Beverly Hills Handicap.

There’s a chance that Fondly Remembered, second to Aube Indienne in the Yellow Ribbon at Santa Anita, will be supplemented for $20,000 to the Matriarch.

Horse Racing Notes

Wayne Lukas, thanks to the Breeders’ Cup, moved ahead of Bill Mott in the national trainers’ standings. Lukas, who led the country 10 consecutive years before Bobby Frankel dislodged him last year, has started horses that have won $8 million. He holds a $1.7-million lead over Mott. . . . Lukas, who won two Breeders’ Cup races and ran 1-2-5 in the Juvenile Fillies with Flanders, Serena’s Song and Lilly Capote, is expected to run another filly, Ocean Cat, in Saturday’s $75,000 Moccasin Stakes at Hollywood. . . . Mike Smith, who rode two Breeders’ Cup winners, has $15 million in purses, breaking the record of $14.4 million by Chris McCarron in 1991. . . . Bertrando, sixth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic after leading the field for almost a mile, will run one more time--either the NYRA Mile at Aqueduct on Nov. 26 or the Hollywood Mile on Nov. 27--before he’s permanently retired to stud. . . . All nine of the races on Hollywood Park’s first Friday night card of the season are claiming races.