Foreigners have keys to Sunday’s features

SUNDAY’s co-features - the BGLC-TOBA Millionaires Series at six and a half furlongs, Race 5, Series 2, and the one-mile Lloyd Lindbergh ‘Lindy’ Delapenha Memorial – will be dominated by foreigners aiming at top-class races this season.

Champion trainer Jason DaCosta has two Americans in the 13-horse line-up in the BGLC-TOBA race, impressive-looking debutant H TWO O and GIRVANO, both made eligible for the $1 million bonus via the $150,000 eligibility-fee route, having not come under the hammer at the Mixed Sale nor TOBA private treaty.

H TWO O has been setting the exercise track alight for the past month, clocking a sizzling 58.4 from the gate at five furlongs straight late January, crowned by 1:12.4 for six furlongs last Sunday morning, dismissing stablemate GIRVANO.

Owned by champion owner, Carlton Watson, whose local-based American, FUNCAANDUN, collared Rohan Crichton’s Florida invader, LEGACY ISLE, at the wire in December’s US$250,000 Mouttet Mile, H TWO O was sired by Divining Rod, a leading Mid-Atlantic sire, the highest-ranked stallion standing outside Kentucky in the United States.

Divining Rod’s profile on countrylifefarm.com credits the 13-year-old stallion, who has a live-foal fee of US$2,500, as having sired runners who have “scored victories from Belmont Park to Gulfstream to Churchill Downs to Hawthorne”.

A son of Tapit and foaled by three-time grade-one winner, Precious Kitten, Divining Rod placed third in the 2015 grade-one Preakness Stakes to Triple Crown winner American Pharoah. Divining Rod also lost a head-bob to Curlin’s son, Connect, in the grade-one $500,000 Cigar Mile.

H TWO O’s flashy exercise form suggests that he should be followed all the way to the 2025 Mouttet Mile, which will be even more competitive with an increased purse of US$300,000, a bounty to attract North American invaders for the third consecutive year.

Meanwhile, Anthony Nunes’ TIZ TOK, a California winner, who was quietly fancied at odds of 7-1 when placing fifth in the Mouttet Mile, returns drilled at exercise for the ‘Lindy’ Delapenha Memorial.

Drawn against the rail in the Mouttet Mile for his first local start, TIZ TOK broke slowly with Shane Ellis but gathered steam down the backstretch to race eighth at the half-mile marker, going past top local mare ATOMICA.

However, the cracking pace set by PACK PLAYS, who was overtaken by LEGACY ISLE coming off the home turn, proved too strong for all but FUNCAANDUN. Straightening eighth, Ellis literally nursed home TIZ TOK for a fifth-place finish against the best horses in the country.

Returning two levels lower and working really well at exercise, seven furlongs in 1:26.1 last week Tuesday, followed by six furlongs in 1:13.1 on Monday, TIZ TOK cannot be opposed.