RT's 12.5 Sunday Stakes Aqueduct Picks: The Hooptie Handicapper takes break from maidens for two NY-bred races
Maiden America 12.05.21
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There are two stakes’ races to dissect and solve today.
Aqueduct Race 5 – The $150K NY Stallion Series Stakes
NY bred Fillies and Mares going seven furlongs on dirt
Steve Asmussen + Jose Lezcano + Three Wins-In-A-Row = a 6/5 morning line favorite with 6-The Important One. Can she be challenged? Can She be beat? Her work tab proves she has done nothing different to draw attention to being off her form. She faces two new challengers that she can go with her: 3-Trinni Luck (5/2) and 4-Bank Sting (3/1). Trinni Luck will be sent out with The Important One and Bank Sting will come from off the pace, and if that scenario plays out, Bank Sting will take her 4:3-0-0 for $148K record at Aqueduct higher. However, The Important One draws clear at the six furlong mark and neither of the two others have hit that fraction in less than a minute, where The Important One is deadliest. However, this is The Important One’s first crack at seven furlongs, so the guess is how slow the jockeys will tolerate allowing Jose Lezcano to attempt to slow the pace. I say Trinni Luck does not and takes the lead from her, given she wired competitors at both eight and seven furlongs twice. I also believe that horses winning three, or more, in a row becomes taxing on them eventually and they have a race where they do not endure, and today sets this up. I will bet that Trinni Luck, Bank Sting, and longshot 5-Awillaway (20/1) are there late and The Important One drops off the board.
Aqueduct Race 10 – The $150K NY Stallion Series Stakes
NY Breds going seven furlongs on dirt
There are four that I like in this. 12-Captain Bombastic (5/1). Back again are Asmussen/Lezcano with this Forty Tales colt and he has a good outside draw to give a shot without interference at the gate. Today may be his day as three of his last four attempts have been on an off track and the one where it wasn’t, he smoked the field at Laurel in a $100K stakes. He’s been freshened up with two works, so he’ll contend. Next is Rinaldi (6/1) where Trevor McCarthy and James Bond try taking this horse off turf for the first time. Him and our other horse of interest, 9-Our Last Buck (4/1) will gun for the lead and whether Rinaldi sustains on dirt is to be seen. The last horse, and the one I am likely to bet, is 7-Wild Banker (8/1) who last out got smoked by yesterday’s Cigar Mile winner Americanrevolution. Yes, I am passing on 4-My Boy Tate (5/2) because he seems to not get there in time in stakes race. He’s likely to hit the board, yet, in my opinion, not first. I am going to play an exacta and a trifecta with Wild Banker and Our Last Buck on top, back and forth, with the other 4 mentioned in tow.
Happy Hunting!