Maiden King

Jockey David Flores shot to the lead on #5 Missilette and never looked back

In this race, seven of the 12 fillies that went to post were running for the first time. But it was #5 Missilette, who was making her fifth start, that dominated the race from start to finish.

Back on June 10, Missilette competed in her only claiming race. She got the lead early and was cruising by three lengths in the stretch before Gator AtFonz’s nailed her.

In that race, Missilette showed that she had legitimate early speed for this class. And at 5-1/2 furlongs early speed is important and these days experience is too.

In fact, since the beginning of 2009, 2-year-old and 3-year-old horses making their debuts at odds of 7/2 to 19/1 have won much less frequently than first timers did in 2007 and 2008. I don’t know what is causing this, but it’s possibly the synthetic surfaces.

Anyway, in this race, Flores hustled Missilette hard from the gate to get the early advantage. She led #9 Darling Disarray and the other eight runners by a length down the backstretch.

On the turn, Martin Garcia was all out on Darling Disarray, but the filly was not gaining ground. At the top of the stretch, Missilette and Darling Disarray were 3-1/2 lengths ahead of the other runners. Missilette pulled away and Darling Disarray tired, but held on for second place.

I ended up betting $300 to win on #9 Darling Disarray at 5/1 and $200 on #1 Darling Ciana at 14/1. Also, I played $30  exactas with Missilette on top and I caught the 5-9 $1 payoff of $22.50.