HOLLYWOOD PARK : Cameras Flash as Serena’s Song Wins the Starlet

The photo finish went Serena’s Song’s way this time, and after that photo there were more pictures Saturday as the three Hollywood Park stewards briefly reviewed a foul claim against the winner of the $250,000 Hollywood Starlet.

In the winner’s circle, Wayne Lukas, Serena’s Song’s trainer, couldn’t figure out what the fuss was about. “If that’s interference,” Lukas said, “then you’ve got it nine times a day, in every race.”

It didn’t compensate for the narrow loss to a stablemate, Flanders, in the $1-million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies at Churchill Downs, but Serena’s Song did add $137,500 to her earnings by holding off Urbane, a one-time $50,000 claimer, at the wire.

“Only the drop of a head beat us in the Breeders’ Cup,” said Robert Lewis, who, with his wife, Beverly, owns Serena’s Song. “In both races, this filly’s shown us what a great heart she has.”

It was a Corey-Corey exacta as the jockeys, Nakatani and Black, played their cat-and-mouse game all the way to the finish line. Black, who had ridden Urbane to victories in her two other starts, claimed that Nakatani had interfered with his filly when Serena’s Song, from the outside post position, dropped over toward the rail going into the first turn.

“I had to take more hold of my filly than it looked,” Black said. “It cost her position and affected how the race set up. He came over and I had to steady enough. It cost me a head. That was more than the difference in the race.”

Black went to his whip at the top of the stretch, whereas Nakatani, in the lead from the first turn on, never used his stick on Serena’s Song.

“She’s unbelievable, the way she’s doing things,” Nakatani said. “I told Wayne before the Breeders’ Cup that I thought she could beat Flanders, and she almost did from the No. 12 post. I did think the Breeders’ Cup might be a little strenuous on her, but she had been working well.”

Flanders, who is owned by another of Lukas’ major clients, W.T. Young, was injured in the Breeders’ Cup and, after undergoing surgery one day after the race, is recovering in Kentucky. Lukas has no inside information, but his guess is that if Flanders wins an Eclipse Award, which she’s favored to do, Young might retire her for breeding.

With four victories, two seconds and a third in 10 races, Serena’s Song has earned $597,335 for the Lewises, who bought her at auction as a yearling for $150,000. She paid $2.80 to win Saturday, running 1 1/16 miles in 1:41 4/5, the fastest time for the Starlet since it was switched from a mile race in 1991. Serena’s Song also won the Landaluce Stakes at Hollywood this summer, and her only loss in four starts at the track was a second-place finish to the colt Mr Purple in the Hollywood Juvenile.

Urbane finished 3 1/2 lengths ahead of Ski Dancer, with Comstock Queen and Kindred Soul rounding out the order of finish in the five-horse field.

Serena’s Song joins Althea and Cuddles as Lukas’ Starlet winners.

“The other filly came up to our filly with a couple of testing moves down the backside,” Lukas said. “But Corey (Nakatani) knew where he was at all times. I thought he rode a very, very heady race. He didn’t have to hit her, which is just as well, because she’s had a long campaign. But she’s held her flesh and condition marvelously through it all. She handled the pressure well today.”

Trainer Brian Mayberry, after winning the Starlet a year ago with Sardula, just missed a second consecutive victory in the stake with Urbane, who ran for a $50,000 claiming price when she broke her maiden at Santa Anita in October. That was double what her owners, the Mace Siegel family, paid for the filly.

“I thought she ran a great race,” Mayberry said Saturday. “Both of those horses are natural-born runners.”

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Lukas will try to sweep the weekend’s 2-year-old stakes when he runs Thunder Gulch today in the $500,000 Hollywood Futurity. Although Thunder Gulch won the Remsen Stakes at Aqueduct in his last start, he is 5-1, behind 3-5 Afternoon Deelites and 2-1 The Exeter Man, on the morning line.

“I know what we’re up against,” Lukas said, “but I still like the idea that I’m running a horse that’s been around two turns and has won a graded stake at a mile and an eighth.”

Thunder Gulch was trained by John Kimmel in New York before Lukas, in an ownership change, took over for the Remsen.

After two sprint victories, undefeated Afternoon Deelites will be stretched out to 1 1/16 miles. He had a blazing workout last Sunday, going seven furlongs in 1:23 1/5.

“Yes, that was awful fast,” said his trainer, Richard Mandella. “It concerns me a little, but I look at it this way: I’d rather know that he can run that fast than think that he can’t.”

Three of the five starters--The Exeter Man, Thunder Gulch and A.J. Jett--are being supplemented into the race for $25,000 apiece. Supplementaries have been successful in the 13 previous editions of the Futurity, with Best Pal, King Glorious, Tejano, Snow Chief, Fali Time and Roving Boy winning after not being nominated.

Horse Racing Notes

In another stake Saturday, Silver Wizard won his second in a row at the meet by capturing the Political Ambition Handicap. He was one of six horses winning from the No. 1 post for the day and gave Eddie Delahoussaye his third victory. . . . Fernando Valenzuela injured his knee when his mount, Don’t Read My Lips, reared in the starting gate before the second race. Valenzuela took the rest of the day off. The filly was scratched by the stewards. . . . Serena’s Song will be prepared for a Santa Anita campaign as a 3-year-old. . . . Her stablemate, Timber Country, the early favorite for the Kentucky Derby, will work for the second time at Santa Anita today. Timber Country is back from a rest after winning the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile and probably will run three times next year in preparation for the Derby. . . . Urbane, supplemented to the Starlet for $12,500, earned $50,000. . . . The National Best Seven, a 50-cent bet that included Hollywood Park’s third race, was worth $17,096.50 for each of the three tickets with seven winners. The pool of $109,000 hit a 29-week low.