This Race Comes Right to Order

It’s not a recommended handicapping system, but the best way to have figured Thursday’s seventh race at Hollywood Park would have been to bet the horses in their post-position order.

You’ve heard of the old 1-2? This was the old 1-2-3-4-5-6-7.

Hope Island, the No. 1 horse ridden by Kent Desormeaux, finished first, one length ahead of Memoranda, who broke from the No. 2 stall. Squall Linda, No. 3, finished third, Pert Laura--No. 4--was fourth, and so on. Completing the order of finish were Deliciosa, Dyna’s Club and Batty Queen.

Knowing racing, which runs about an estimated 60,000 races a year, this oddity has probably happened before, but officials at Hollywood Park can’t remember it ever happening at their track.

“It’s likely that it’s happened here in a smaller field,” said Mike Mooney, a Hollywood Park spokesman. “But what made it so unusual was for it to happen in a field of seven horses.”

Surely the odds on that are astronomical. Mooney quipped that he figured them at 5,039-1.

Actually, the field hardly changed positions from the eighth pole home in the 6 1/2-furlong race for $62,500 claimers. The first three finishers--Hope Island, Memoranda and Squall Linda--were in that position at the top of the stretch, and Dyna’s Club and Batty Queen were sixth and seventh and couldn’t improve on those spots. Deliciosa, fourth with an eighth of a mile left, wound up fifth, and Pert Laura moved up from fifth to fourth.

Hope Island, a 5-year-old mare that hadn’t won since December 1997, paid $9.60 to win. Squall Linda, a winner at Hollywood two weeks ago, was the 13-10 favorite.

A $2 exacta on Hope Island and Memoranda--the 1-2, naturally--was worth $36.80. A $2 quinella with the same horses paid $22.20, and, in the trifecta, the old 1-2-3 of Hope Island, Memoranda and Squall Linda was good for $107.60 for $2.