[RolloTomasi]

In Search Of Two-Turn Stakes Race, Tom’s D’Etat Could Head To Gold Cup At Santa Anita

The frustration earlier in the career of Grade 1 Clark Handicap winner Tom's d'Etat was that G M B Racing's talented horse missed so much racing while sidelined with niggling physical issues. “He's had a lot of stay-at-home social distancing in his life,” trainer Al Stall Jr. wryly observed.

This feels like we’re about to be in for some more excuses for not running…

Now 7, Tom's d'Etat has enjoyed most of two unimpeded years to great success, but the frustration has returned: This time over having a horse ready to run and, amid the coronavirus' disruption of horse racing, no logical place to race.

Bingo. Let’s just nip that last disingenuous statement in the bud before we get out of hand with the smoke blowing.

So the horse that won what was essentially the final prep for the Oaklawn Handicap (the Apr 11 Oaklawn Mile), who also stayed at Oaklawn Park after the race and continued to train, doesn’t have a logical place to run?

And to compound the audacity to complain, they only wait a couple days after the Oaklawn Handicap is run?

Stall's plan called for Tom's d'Etat to return off a scheduled freshening in the April 11 Ben Ali at Keeneland. However, on March 16, Keeneland canceled its spring meet. Rerouting to the New Orleans Classic at the Fair Grounds, where Tom's d'Etat was training, was not an option as that field had been set two days earlier.

More of the same. Yes, Keeneland cancelled on March 16 a couple of days after they took entries for the New Orleans Classic. But several days and even weeks before March 16, Keeneland was making overtures that cancelling the meet was a distinct possibility. So why not enter in the New Orleans Classic just as a backup?

If anyone is concerned with the logistics of calling an audible to run at Fair Grounds at the eleventh hour, Tom’s d’Etat was in full training at the Fair Grounds all winter long…

Plan B was going to Arkansas' Oaklawn Mile, also on April 11, a race Tom's d'Etat won over the talented Improbable.
Stall opted not to run Tom's d'Etat back in this past Saturday's Oaklawn Handicap because he had his eye on the Blame Stakes at 1 1/8 miles on May 30, a new stakes Churchill Downs created as prep for the Stephen Foster.

So while the horse was at Oaklawn training after his comeback win and the track was preparing to run the major 2-turn stakes for older horses, they were planning on running in a new race at a track that wasn’t even cleared to open or even allow horses to ship into at the time?

Makes sense…

The day after the Oaklawn Handicap, Churchill Downs' revised stakes schedule for the track's shortened spring meet came out with the Blame changed to a mile around one turn. A distance horse, Tom's d'Etat has only raced around one turn once, and that was because an allowance race came off the turf.

More half-truths. Tom’s d’Etat has in fact raced around one-turn only once in his career. Guess what? It was at Churchill Downs, the same track as the Blame, the same track he won his only Grade 1 race at, and if that isn’t enough…he won the one-turn race by over 7 lengths against 2 stakes winners…

Now Tom's d'Etat instead could be headed to the $300,000 Gold Cup at Santa Anita, a Grade 1 race at 1 1/4 miles on June 6, if live racing in Southern California resumes by then.

Lesson still not learned. So Churchill Downs now has some firm dates for reopening so the Blame is likely to go. Santa Anita does not know when it will reopen. Let’s point for Santa Anita…

“I don't think it's fair to the horse to go in off a short-stretch mile race against a horse like By My Standards, who has had three good, strong two-turn races so far,” Stall said. “I'm not sure what to do.”

This is hilarious. Firstly, By My Standards is now some sort of superhorse? He has never been the favorite in any of his stakes appearances.

Secondly, the reason he has “three good, strong two-turn races so far”? He ran in both the New Orleans Classic and the Oaklawn Handicap!

Kinda of a vicious circle going on here…

“I can't believe things have been so weird. It's just frustration. Things just haven't gone his way, but it will get caught up sooner or later. We'll get him back up to Churchill Downs next week, training him regularly and see what happens.”

See what happens? Easy...Churchill Downs will run the Blame Stakes on May 30. And one way or the other, Tom's d'Etat will probably be on the grounds at Churchill at the time...

At age 7, he's only run 17 times, with 10 victories. That also means there's not the wear and tear one might expect to start showing on a horse his age.

Is the author of this article not paying attention? No “wear and tear”? The first part of this rickety sob story is that the horse has been plagued by injuries throughout his career…

“He's actually better because he's had a regular career for the past two years now,” Stall said. “His time off this winter at the Fair Grounds was just a plain old freshening. We really thought he'd run a good race off the bench, which he does anyway.”

This is exhausting. So now he’s great off the bench.

So why are we worried if he ends up not having a start before the Stephen Foster?