Love Theway Youare wins Vanity Handicap

Everything pointed toward Include Me Out joining the likes of Zenyatta, Blind Luck and Azeri as a winner of the Grade I $250,000 Vanity Handicap.

Sent off as the 3-5 favorite on Saturday at Betfair Hollywood Park, Include Me Out easily took the lead entering the stretch in the 1 1/8-mile race and seemed to be cruising to victory in mid-stretch.

And that might have been the big problem. She offered little resistance when 18-1 longshot Love Theway Youare and jockey Garrett Gomez came charging and pulled away for a 2 1/2-length victory.

Ron Ellis, trainer for second-place Include Me Out, was not pleased with jockey Joe Talamo.

“She moved too early,” Ellis said. “He got a little too confident. She pulls herself up too.”

Include Me Out was bidding for her fourth consecutive graded stakes victory. Scratches of her expected two main competitors, Zazu (injury) and Ellafitz (illness), made Include Me Out the heavy favorite.

Instead, it was the Myung Kwon Cho-trained Love Theway Youare that ended an 11-race losing streak for the 4-year-old daughter of Arch. Cho missed the race to attend a high school graduation ceremony involving his son.

In the first stakes for 2-year-olds at the meeting, Amarish was an impressive 4 1/2 -length winner over Moreno’s Mine under jockey Edwin Maldonado in the $100,000 Willard L. Proctor Stakes at 5 1/2 furlongs. The gelded son of Scat Daddy won his debut race by 7 3/4 lengths May 26.

“He’s a very talented horse, no question about it,” trainer Jeff Bonde said.

In the $100,000 Cinderella Stakes, Miss Empire, a daughter of Empire Maker trained by Peter Miller, won by five lengths over Awesome Annie under jockey Kevin Krigger.

eric.sondheimer@latimes.com