Tuesday, December 07, 2010
Graded stakes winners Prospect To The Top, Fast Movin Vic, and Jumpn Shake are among the 52 2-year-olds entered in Friday’s Sunland Park Winter Futurity (G2) trials, as Sunland Park opens its 77-day meet with an 11-race program.
Post time for the first race is 12:25 p.m. (MST).
A bay colt by Coronas Prospect racing for Joel Tavarez, Prospect To The Top has earned $235,280 from six starts, and his four wins include the October 10, $313,499 Hobbs America Futurity (G2) at Zia Park. The colt also ran third, 1 ¾ lengths behind winner Cold Cash 123, in the $245,000 Southwest Juvenile Championship (G1) at Zia Park on November 28, and he was a finalist in the September 6, $1.9-million All American Futurity (G1) at Ruidoso Downs.
Fast Movin Vic is a homebred Mighty Invictus gelding who scored a half-length victory in the August 7 AQHA Ruidoso Juvenile Challenge Stakes (G3) for his owner, David Barrett of Alto, New Mexico. Fast Movin Vic is coming off of a close second-place finish to A Plain Brown Rapper in the November 19, $150,000 AQHA Juvenile Challenge Championship (G2) at Fair Grounds Racecourse in New Orleans.
Jumpn Shake is a sorrel colt by Jumpn whose six wins in nine outs includes the 350-yard, $167,050 Gillespie County Fair Futurity (G3) on August 29. The California-bred colt races for Chad Hart and Bobby D. Cox.
The 10 fastest qualifiers will meet in the $50,000-added Sunland Park Winter Futurity final on December 26.
The Winter Futurity is one of 56 stakes races on Sunland Park’s schedule. As in past years, the Thoroughbred stakes schedule is headed by the Grade 3, $800,000 Sunland Derby for 3-year-olds on the Triple Crown trail on March 27. The Sunland Derby is one of just six stakes that will be run on that date – others include the $200,000 Sunland Park Oaks for 3-year-old fillies, and the $120,000 La Coneja Stakes (R) for New Mexico-bred fillies and mares.
Other key Thoroughbred stakes include the $100,000-added Riley Allison Futurity – named after the track’s founder – on December 28, and the $100,000 Borderland Derby on February 26. Run four weeks before the Sunland Derby, the Borderland Derby serves as that stakes’ major local prep.
Sunland’s Quarter Horse stakes schedule features 15 graded events, topped by the 10th running of the Grade 1, $350,000 Championship at Sunland Park on December 26. Past winners of the Championship include world champions A Ransom and Streakin Sin Tacha, and divisional champions Fredricksburg, Gotta Get, Ketel Won, and First Moonflash.
Other key Quarter Horse stakes include the 440-yard, $110,000-added Bank of America New Mexico Challenge Championship (G1) on April 10, the 300-yard, $120,000-added New Mexican Spring Futurity (RG1) for state-bred 2-year-olds on April 10, and the 300-yard, $100,000 West Texas Futurity (G1) on April 17.
Sunland Park’s meet runs through April 19, 2011. For more information, including a first condition book and complete stakes schedule, visit the track’s website at www.sunland-park.com, or call the racing office at (575) 874-5200.