After watching Ethereal Road work 5 furlongs from the gate earlier this week at Oaklawn, Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas said the eye-catching maiden winner earlier in the meeting will make his next start in the $1 million Rebel Stakes (G2) for 3-year-olds on Feb. 26.
The Rebel offers 85 points toward starting eligibility for the Kentucky Derby to the top four finishers (50-20-10-5). The race is then followed by the April 2 Arkansas Derby as final Oaklawn stepping stone races to the Derby.
Ethereal Road drew post 10 in the 11-horse field and is 12-to- 1 in the morning line. Post time for the Rebel, race 11, is 6:22 p.m. Eastern.
A son of Quality Road, Ethereal Road finished seventh, fifth and third in his first three starts before storming home to break his maiden by four widening lengths at 1 1/16 miles Jan. 29 under Luis Contreras.
The performance was noteworthy because Ethereal Road hesitated and bobbled at the start, according to footnotes from the official race chart, and trailed by 16 lengths after a quarter-mile and 12 ½ lengths after a half-mile before he began picking off rivals on the second turn.
Five wide turning for home, Ethereal Road mowed down five horses in the final three-sixteenths of a mile to win going away at odds of 19-1. The final time over a fast track was 1:46.82.
Lukas said he doesn’t know why, under extraordinary circumstances, it finally clicked for Ethereal Road, a $90,000 Keeneland September Yearling Sales graduate who is owned by Aaron Sones.
“If I knew that, I would be a better trainer,” Lukas said. “Man, you talk about left. He was in another area code.”
Because Ethereal Road is a large horse – he stands 16.3 hands and weighs around 1,300 pounds – his poor break was magnified when compared to a smaller horse, Lukas said.
“It takes them three-eighths of a mile to get that momentum again to get going,” Lukas said. “But when they get going, if they’ve got ability, again, I emphasize that – they’ve got to have ability – when they get going, they pass horses if they’ve got the ability. What he did on the turn, if you just took the video and ran it up the half mile and said, ‘Oh, here, let’s watch this’ – from the half mile (pole) to the wire, that was spectacular. Every jump he passed a horse.”
Ethereal Road had his penultimate work for the Rebel Tuesday morning, covering 5 furlongs out of the gate in 1:01.80.
Lukas said Contreras will ride Ethereal Road in the 1 1/16-mile Rebel, which is Oaklawn’s third of four Kentucky Derby points races.
Lukas won the Rebel in 1989 with Manastash Ridge and again in 2013 with Will Take Charge, who captured an Eclipse Award that year as the country’s champion 3-year-old male.
In addition to Ethereal Road, other locally-based Rebel candidates include Dash Attack for trainer Kenny McPeek, Barber Road (John Ortiz), Ben Diesel (Dallas Stewart) and Chasing Time (Steve Asmussen).
Dash Attack (Munnings, post 11) won the $250,000 Smarty Jones Stakes Jan. 1, a 1-mile race that was Oaklawn’s first Kentucky Derby points event. Baffert collected Oaklawn’s second, the $750,000 Southwest Stakes (G3) at 1 1/16 miles Jan. 29, with unbeaten Newgrange (Violence, post 2). Barber Road (Race Day, post 9) finished second in the Smarty Jones and Southwest. Ben Diesel (Will Take Charge, post 7) was seventh in the Smarty Jones and third in the Southwest. Chasing Time (Not This Time, post 8) was a 7 ¾-length first-level allowance winner at 1 mile Jan. 14. Favoured in all five career starts, the Rebel will be his stakes debut.
Contreras rides 3-to-2 favourite SECRET OATH (Arrogate) in the Honey Bee Stakes, race 5, also for Lukas.
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