Some races you win. Some you lose. And every now and then a horse loses one in a way that tells you more than a win would have. On Friday at Del Mar, in the biggest test of a young career, Party Animal ran his heart out – and came up a head short of the lot.
The $150,000 Real Good Deal Stakes is a black-type sprint for California-bred three-year-olds, seven furlongs on a fast track, and it was a genuine step up in class for our chestnut. Eleven went to the post. Sent off at better than 26-1 – the market plainly unconvinced – Party Animal broke well from post five under Jose Morelos and went straight into the fight.
Pressing the pace from the outside, the gelding ranged up alongside the leader, He’s a Knockout, at the half-mile pole and, under urging, actually put a head in front rounding the bend. For a few strides at the top of the lane it looked as though the upset was on. But the favorite is a hard-knocking sort, dug back in along the rail, and the pair went at it stride for stride to the wire. At the line it was He’s a Knockout by a head, with Party Animal a length and a quarter clear of the rest.
He ran his heart out. To step him up into stakes company and have him beaten only in the final strides, by a good horse, in a driving finish – that’s a very promising day.
– The Bushman team
Watch · Race replay
A step up, answered
What pleases us most is how Party Animal handled the class rise. Stakes company is a different afternoon – a bigger crowd, sharper rivals, a faster, more honest pace – and the gelding met all of it head on, breaking sharply, showing the speed to take the fight to the favorite from the outside, and, most tellingly, still giving when a lesser horse would have flattened out. Final time was a quick 1:22.71.
Where he goes next
A game second in a race like this, at that price, against a field that respected the gelding a good deal more on the way home than the odds board did on the way out. Party Animal came out of it in good order, and there is plenty to build on. As always, the plan bends to the horse – but on the strength of Friday, the future looks bright.
