Racing at Hollywood Park with Marc Doche: No easy task for Nereid in Wilshire

by Marc on April 29, 2012

Briecat is back on the Hollywood Park turf course in today's $100,000 Wilshire Handicap (Grade III) for the first time since sprinting to victory by a nose in the Cool Air last December.

After notching five stakes wins through the first three days of the meet, Rafael Bejarano is conspicuously mount less despite eight females being entered in today’s featured $100,000 Wilshire Handicap (Grade III) at a mile on turf.

Nereid is the 5-to-2 morning line favorite making her first stakes start against older runners after closing her 3-year-old campaign with a win and a pair of third-place finishes in Grade I events. Joe Talamo has been aboard the daughter of Rock Hard Ten in all six career starts, but Mike Smith takes over for the first time today for trainer John Shirreffs.

Talamo sticks with 6-to-1 shot Briecat instead after guiding her to a fourth-place finish in the American Beauty at Santa Anita three weeks ago. The 7-year-old daughter of Adcat has won nearly a third of her 32 starts and could have a pace advantage today looking to keep Vladimir Cerin’s hot streak going.

Up In Time is the 7-to-2 second choice moving back to Joel Rosario for the first time since her U.S. debut last March. She packs a late punch along with 4-to-1 co-third choices Wild Mia and Go Forth North.

We’re off to the races!

Pick 4 -

Leg 1 – Race 6 (1,2,3,4) – No.1 Fifth Commandment is attractive at a big price dropping out of stakes ranks to face claimers so we’ll use here along with the trio of No. 2 Missdealornodeal, No. 3 Talktoomuch and No. 4 Miss Reditore.

Leg 2 – Race 7 (5,8.9.11) – Four more here with No. 5 Star Nicholas, No. 8 Hasty Trend, No. 9 Imperial Pride and No. 11 Afleet Deal.

Leg 3 – Race 8 (ALL) –No. 3 Nereid is an extremely beatable favorite today, so we’ll hope to shake things up with a price using the all button.

Leg 4 – Race 9 (2,6) – No. 2 Running Isabella is strictly the one to beat on the barn upgrade, but there’s a good amount of other speed lined up which could set things up for No. 6 Secret Genius to mow them down.

Recap – (1,2,3,4) w (5,8,9,11) w (ALL) w (2,6) – Total cost of ticket = $128

Yesterday’s Result – (+$61.55)

Total for currentHollywoodParkspring/summer meet – (-$112.45)

Total from 12/26/10-4/22/12 – (+$588.70)

Pick 5 –

Leg 1 – Race 1 (ALL) – No. 4 Lovmeister and No. 5 Playful Council get top marks from the morning clockers and No. 6 Valley Spirit is the only one with experience, but we’ll punch the all button with the babies.

Leg 2 – Race 2 (ALL) – Evenly matched Cal-bred females on the turf and we’ll use all seven.

Leg 3 – Race 3 (3,7) – No. 7 J J’s Jaguar should win right back moving from one good barn to another and with a sharp work over the track, but if he gets caught in a speed duel, No. 3 Teasing Bernie can continue his miraculous recovery by running them down late.

Leg 4 – Race 4 (1,2,3) – Come and catch No. 1 McKenzies Way, which is what one of the Bob Baffert’s, No. 2 Classic Legacy or No. 3 Tweebster, will likely do.

Leg 5 – Race 5 (9) – Baffert looks super tough again here with No. 9 Sequoia Warrior off a huge effort in his local debut.

Recap – (ALL) w (ALL) w (3,7) w (1,2,3) w (9) – Total cost of ticket = $147

Yesterday’s Result – (-$216)

Total for currentHollywoodParkspring/summer meet – (-$25.25)

Total from 7/20/10-4/22/12 (+$2,150.80)

Best Bet of the Day – Can now be found at www.theracingedition.com along with an early Pick-4 ticket and a consensus box for the entire card.

Make sure to follow me on Twitter @mdoche for last minute changes caused by scratches and much more!

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For more Hollywood Park action check out Jarrod Horak’s Pick 6 Blog.

Good luck!

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