Lukas Wants Commitment to California

After the Santa Anita meeting ended last April, horseplayers didn’t make much money betting trainer Wayne Lukas’ horses in California the rest of the year.

Lukas, who led the country in purses all but one year from 1983 through 1997, has had another solid year. According to Equibase, he’s the No. 3 trainer in purses, behind cinch-champion Bob Baffert and runner-up Bobby Frankel, but only 16% of Lukas’ total of $10.3 million has been earned in California, which used to be home for the strongest horses in the stable.

Lately, Lukas has concentrated his best stock at Churchill Downs, using the Louisville track as a launching pad for other attractive stakes races around the country. As a result, Lukas made a slight impression last season at Santa Anita--mainly because of the brilliant filly Surfside--but after that was not a factor during the two meets at Hollywood Park, the summer season at Del Mar and Oak Tree’s fall stand at Santa Anita.

Lukas spent little time on the West Coast. Randy Bradshaw, his No. 1 assistant, was in charge out here.

To the left is a meet-by-meet breakdown of what the Lukas stable has done in California this year.

“That’s going to change,” Lukas said. “We expect to have more of a presence in California [in 2001].”

The renewed commitment begins today at Santa Anita, where Lukas will run Spain, his surprising Breeders’ Cup Distaff winner, in the La Brea Stakes for 3-year-old fillies.

“We switched the emphasis away from California [in 2000] for a good reason,” Lukas said. “Our important clients were back East for the most part. Take Bill Young [of Overbrook Farm]. He’s got a $5-million home in Kentucky, and he doesn’t like to travel too far from it to watch his horses run. But this is another year, and we’ll do a lot better out here this time.”

Lukas has won 17 graded stakes this year, five fewer than Baffert and Frankel, who have 22 apiece. But in Grade I stakes, Lukas leads the country with seven. Baffert could tie him today if his revived filly, Chilukki, wins the La Brea. Frankel, whose six Grade I victories match Baffert’s total, is running Serenita, an untested filly from Argentina, in the La Brea.

Overall, Baffert has won 27 stakes--graded and ungraded--in California in 2000, and he and Frankel, who has 23, are far ahead of anyone else. Lukas isn’t even among the California leaders. His only three graded wins here were registered by Surfside during Santa Anita’s winter meet.

Surfside races for Young and Spain runs for Prince Ahmed Salman’s Thoroughbred Corp. Surfside is the favorite to win the Eclipse award for 3-year-old filly, no matter what her stablemate does today. It’s an injustice, however, that most voters won’t take the time to consider the La Brea, but all the blame can’t be heaped on the electorate. It’s the National Thoroughbred Racing Assn. that can’t wait to tally the votes. Ballots must be received in New York by noon next Tuesday. Not many voters will wait for the La Brea and send their ballots by fax.

Surfside has already won two Grade I races, both at Santa Anita last winter, and she followed up her second-place finish behind Spain in the Breeders’ Cup by beating males in the Clark Handicap, a Grade II, at Churchill Downs on Nov. 24. Other double Grade I winners, Jostle and Secret Status, are expected to be out-polled, Jostle because of her last-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup.

Spain, who was 55-1 in the Breeders’ Cup, hasn’t won in California since she was a 2-year-old, when Jeff Bonde was the trainer and she was running on the Northern California fair circuit. This will be Spain’s fourth race against Chilukki, who was the champion 2-year-old filly in 1999. Chilukki beat her twice, while winning the Del Mar Debutante and the Oak Leaf at Santa Anita, and out-finished Spain again while running second in the 1999 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies.

This year’s 1 1/8-mile Distaff was too far for Chilukki. Instead, Baffert ran her on the first race on the Breeders’ Cup card, and her winning time of 1:33 2/5 in the Churchill Downs Distaff Handicap broke the track record. At seven furlongs, the La Brea seems perfect for Chilukki.

Spain, on the other hand, hasn’t sprinted since the Del Mar Debutante and she’s won only one race at less than a mile.

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Laffit Pincay rode three winners Friday, his 54th birthday.

Pincay needs one more, either today or Sunday, to hit the 200 mark for the first year since 1991.

Pincay’s winners Friday were Joke in the second race, Rare Charmer in the fourth and Diamonds And Divas in the eighth and last race on the card.

Rare Charmer had been winless this year and won for the first time in about 15 months. Diamonds And Divas broke her maiden in her sixth start.

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With a 39-1 shot, Aviate, Pincay finished fifth as favored Evening Promise continued to thrive on Santa Anita’s downhill turf course with a two-length victory over Squall Linda, at 51-1, in the $114,400 Monrovia Handicap.

Evening Promise, trained by Kathy Walsh and ridden by Kent Desormeaux, won for the fourth time in five tries at 6 1/2 furlongs on the grass.

“She soaks it all in,” Desormeaux said. “Most horses probably get confused over that course, but she’s a pro.”

Since Walsh began training the British import in the fall of 1999, Evening Promise has won four of 10 starts. The 4-year-old filly had lost nine in a row, seven in England, before Walsh saddled her at Santa Anita last January for her first U.S. win.

Notes

Jockey Chris McCarron was impressed with Tiznow’s 1:24 2/5 seven-furlong workout. . . . More retirements because of injuries: Smooth Player, a 4-year-old filly who earned $760,496, and Hal’s Pal, a 7-year-old gelding who earned $579,821. . . . Anticipating a severe winter storm, Aqueduct has canceled its cards for today and Sunday.

Jockey Shane Sellers, who ranks third in purses this year with $14.8 million, will be sidelined for at least three months after he undergoes surgery on his left knee next week. Sellers was injured at the New Orleans Fair Grounds on Dec. 21 when a filly, warming up for her first start, threw him in the post parade.

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Lukas in California

Meet-by-meet breakdown of D. Wayne Lukas’ stable results in California this year:

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Track Starts Wins Santa Anita 69 12 Hollywood Park 21 1 Del Mar 26 2 Oak Tree 19 4 Hollywood Park (fall) 44 3 Totals 179 22

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