The Canadian-bred three-year-old fillies had their day last weekend in the Woodbine Oaks and now it’s time for the ‘open’ category to get some of the goods. The Grade 3 Ontario Colleen, worth $135,000, has a a solid field of fillies going one mile on the E. P. Taylor turf course, race 8, on Saturday, one of two graded events on the day.
Trainers MARK CASSE and KEVIN ATTARD have six entered of the 13 in the Colleen but the race favourite is likely to be Josie Carroll trainee SABATINI, the fast-rising star from LNJ Foxwoods and NK Racing. Sabatini won the Star Shoot Stakes sprinting on Tapeta to win her maiden, was second in the Ruling Angel and then won the Grade 3 Selene Stakes on Tapeta. She is by a good grass sire in Uncle Mo and her dam was a winner on turf.
The Casse gals are Crevalle d’Oro, second in the Selene with a good run and a grass winner for Blue Crevalle Racing and Quintessential Florida, Time to Dazzle, a sharp debut winner over colts on turf last fall who has been off since March, and last year’s champion two-year-old filly Witwatersrand, a somewhat erratic type who won the Ruling Angel and was third in the Selene.
Kevin Attard has Rosa, Tripolina and Airosa, the latter two coming off layoffs and the former coming off a sixth in the Alywow Stakes to Dancing Duchess.
The major contenders in the race in addition to Sabatini appear to be Colebrook Farms’ SIMPLY IN FRONT, a Summer Front filly who made a premature run to the lead in the Tepin Stakes at Churchill in June, a race won by the very good filly Dancing N Dixie. Simply in Front won an allowance race on the Churchill turf before that outing. Justin Stein rides and she gets back on lasix for trainer Pat Dixon.
Charles Fipke’s Ready for Shirl is two for three in her brief career and this is her first stakes outing. She won both races on the grass and she is a daughter of Breeders’ Cup winner Perfect Shirl.
Race 9 is the 107th SEAGRAM CUP (G2) at 1 1/16 miles for three-year-olds and upward, a race named for Joseph Seagram, one of Canada’s top owners and breeders who won eight straight Queen’s Plates.
The Seagram, worth $175,000, was inaugurated in 1903 but on 15 occasions it was not held.
The great ACE MARINE won the 1955 Seagram Cup at Old Woodbine and that horse won all three races of the Canadian Triple Crown before the series was so-named.
The race is the third event since June 1 for older horses at a route distance following the Grade 2 Eclipse and Grade 2 Dominion Day. The winners of those races, Palazzi and Paramount Prince, both trained by Mark Casse, are in the Seagram field.
Palazzi, a deep closer, will need some luck as there is not much early speed in the field other than his stablemate ‘Prince’ and another mate, Volcanic.
American trainer Joe Sharp is sending up Money Supply, by Practical Joke and this guy has won seven of his last 10 races including the Grade 3 Mineshaft Stakes at Fair Grounds and the Jonathan Schuster Memorial Stakes in his grass debut at Horseshoe Indianapolis on July 6.
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