Dreaming of Anna
 

Anybody got speed figs for her performance yesterday? She looked really strong for probably the first time all year. She was very quick out of the gate, sped through the opening half, and still had another gear in the stretch.
I know she wasn't exactly running against All Along and Ouija Board out there, and she did have things pretty much her own way on the front end, but I thought it was a pretty impressive performance visually, and her time was very strong.

not sure of the final time but her splits were slow.loafed on the lead unchallanged..well you know what happens when a class horse gets easy frac on the lead..lights out.. congats to her and the connections..mark her down for a artie shiller type play against..if she goes vs anyone tough

Calamari and Ravioli are an automatic toss outside of Illinois.

I'm not sure I would call 23.31 for the opening quarter on Arlington's turf yesterday "loafing." Afterall, it was the fastest opening quarter of any of the four races run on the turf yesterday, and although the other three races were not high class fields, they were were all at shorter distances than the 9f Pucker Up. She did get to the lead relatively easily, but still, her final time (1:48.20) was the second fastest Pucker Up in the last thirteen years, and the course wasn't exactly lightning fast yesterday. I thought it was a pretty impressive performance.
Now that doesn't mean she is going to start shipping outside of Chicago to win G1s again like she did last year, but I certainly think it was her best performance since last year's BC.

I was not expecting this performance from this horse on Saturday:(

I thought she looked pretty freaking good. Not a whole lot of world beaters in that bunch, but there were certainly some decent plays against her on paper and she tore them up.

I also wouldn't discount the potential that she's just improving on the turf with age -- Lewis Michael has become a totally different horse this year at age 4.

in the past i've played against both those horses, Lewis Michael and DOA.
i've reassessed both of them now based on the last couple races. they both look like they have indeed moved forward to new levels.

They're looking at sending LM to Dubai to run in the world cup next spring.

it sounds outrageous, but frankly i don't blame them for thinking big. big purses over there in the desert. the horse is coming around.

that seemed to work last year at Churchill

According to DRF.Com she received a 91 Beyer Figure.

That figure was "projected". Using the variant for the other turf races would have given her around 100, which is what I think she deserved.

It'll be interesting to see how he does over a conventional dirt track should they send him to the BC. He's run big races over dirt tracks in the past, namely last year, but he's really moved forward at Keeneland and Arlington this Spring/Summer, so it'll be the big question -- whether he can reproduce these top scores on a conventional track.

If he can -- he's got a shot at just about anything here in the states at the very least.