The Sham Stakes G3

The Sham G3

SA  R5  Sat. 1/11/14

This is the Sham but I would be more inclined to call it the Shame. With all those 3 yr old horses prepared to contest the Triple Crown, the best they can do is 6 entries?

I suppose the answer lies in the fact that this race is only worth 10 Derby points so why waste your horse here when you can take a shot at a race worth 50 and almost be sure of getting into the big show. I have been in favor of the point system but when there are 18 races worth 10 points, 8 races worth 50 points and 7 worth 100, I guess the thinking is, why take a chance on the horse getting hurt or whatever for a lousy 10 points when you can take 1 shot, get lucky and your in. So, what we get is graded races for young horses with only 6 entries. I think that sucks!

As to this race, we have another graded race with all but one entry coming off a maiden win. Would you call this a bettable race? Two of the favorites have had but one race so I find it hard to get enthused about any of them.

I will say that there are a couple of nice pedigrees in here and the one I like is Kristo who has the type of breeding that's had an awful lot of success in recent years and he is my top choice. I love the Northern Dancer mares and the sire line of RAN is almost always good when coupled with these type mares. He has speed, as do most of these, but I think he will be able to carry that speed a long way.

Midnight Hawk has a kind of Heinz "57" pedigree that consists of several outstanding sire lines with little to none in the way of inbreeding. When it comes to breeding, the reason there is a lot of inbreeding done is that it makes things a little more predictable when the number of possibilities are cut down. So, Midnight Hawk may be a very good one but not knowing which horses in his pedigree will exert the most influence, I have to take a wait and see stance.

Top Fortitude is in the same category as Midnight Hawk and may also turn out to be very good but we will know more when they go up against some accomplished runners.

Ontology has a fairly nice pedigree but it remains to be seen if he can handle the dirt. He's had more races than any of them but, although showing signs, he has taken 8 races to break his maiden.

1- #1 Kristo
2- #6 Midnight Hawk
3- Top Fortitude
4- Ontology

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