Ten New York Claiming Championship Stakes at Aqueduct on Saturday

By NY Hot List staff | Thursday, March 24, 2022

The seventh New York Claiming Championships will be featured at Aqueduct on Saturday with 10 starter allowance stakes worth $620,000. The races will cover distances ranging from six furlongs to 1 3/8 miles with 93 horses entered.

On a typical big day of stakes racing at Belmont Park or Saratoga the entries would be dominated by horses trained by Todd Pletcher, Chad Brown, and Christophe Clement. However, with most of their horses in Florida for the winter, the trainers that lead the entries are instead – Randi Persaud with seven; Juan Vasquez, Linda Rice and Eduardo Jones have five each; while Rob Falcone, Jr., Jimmy Ferraro, and Wayne Potts enter four from their barns.

“Days like this are important,” Falcone, Jr. said. “The claiming rank and allowance horses make up the race cards day in and day out. It’s good to have a day for them. They are all really nice horses, but not every horse can be a million-dollar horse. It’s nice for them to get a shot to run in a starter stake. These are the types of horses who make the cards go each day.”

The $80,000 Caixa Eletronica (STR 40k), Aqueduct, Saturday, Race 9.

(3) Answer In is one of four horses that trainer Falcone, Jr. has entered on today’s card and he claimed this gelding two races ago for $40,000 in December and brought him back last month in a rare third-level allowance where he ran second after a bumpy start. (2) Zoomer was claimed out of his last three races and three back it was for the required $40,000. He won his two most recent starts for $50,000 and then $62,500, both times were going a mile. Zoomer now runs for Linda Rice. (5) Repo Rocks will drop down from a pair of top three finishes in Grade 3 stakes at Aqueduct. Since getting claimed for $40,000 at Saratoga, he finished second or third in 6 out of 7 starts. (1) Prince James was claimed from 3 out of his last 4 starts with a win for $25,000 two races back and then had the lead in the stretch and finished second in an allowance race.

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