Chancery Way © Benoit Photo
Del Mar continues the opening weekend of its 10th fall racing season Sunday with the highlight event being the 28th edition of the $100,000 Betty Grable Stakes, a seven-panel spin for fillies and mares born or sired in the California.
The race is part of the Golden State Stakes Series overseen by the CTBA which consists of 39 events run at tracks up and down the state worth a total of $4.85 million. Del Mar hosts 10 of the races – eight in the summer and two in the fall – worth $1,325,000.
The 5/2 favorite for the dash is the quick filly Chancery Way, a 4-year-old daughter of Mr. Big owned by Smolich and Smolich and trained by Jamey Thomas. The bay has won five of her 10 starts, usually on the front end. Antonio Fresu will be aboard the speedster for the first time.
Her chief threat appears to be Nick Alexander’s homebred Rose Dawson, a grey 4-year-old by the owner’s home stallion Grazen. Phil D’Amato is the conditioner of the three-time winner and he’s gotten top rider Juan Hernandez to sign on again for the Sunday special. She’s been hung the second choice in the field at 3-1.
Here’s the full field for the race in post position order with riders and morning line odds:
Chancery Way; Out of the Blue Stables’ Bella D, Giovanni Franco (15-1); Harris Farms’ Glorious Spring, Flavien Prat (8-1); Jay Em Ess Stable’s Power Surge, Tiago Periera (8-1); Tessar or Bach’s Smoothlikebuttah, Umberto Rispoli (8-1); Jaime Renella’s Chismosa, Edgar Payeras (5-1); Nick Alexander’s Carmen Miranda, Ramon Vazquez (4-1), and Rose Dawson.
The Betty Grable is named, of course, for the movie star and pin-up queen of World War II who was a big fan of Del Mar. She was a regular at the track in the ‘40s and ‘50s where she and her husband – bandleader and trumpet player Harry James – raced horses regularly. Their homebred colt Big Noise (the moniker by which James’ famous trumpet was known) won the 1951 Del Mar Futurity and was considered one of the favorites for the 1952 Kentucky Derby until an injury took him out of the picture.
The Betty Grable will go off at approximately 4 p.m. Sunday.