SANTA ANITA : Tactics for Best Pal Discarded

Even though Best Pal failed to become the second horse to win two Santa Anita Handicaps, Kent Desormeaux isn’t ready to give up on the 5-year-old gelding.

Confident going into the $1-million race, Desormeaux didn’t waver after Best Pal finished fifth, beaten by 5 1/2 lengths, at 7-5 odds in his second start of the year.

“He had a $1-million dollar prep. That’s the bottom line,” Desormeaux said. “I thought I was 1-9 going in today and he ran good, but he just got tired. He was really laboring the last sixteenth of a mile.

“You’ll probably see the old Best Pal next time. I was hoping it would be today. If he gets dusted the next time he runs, you can ask me the same question and I’ll probably have a different answer.”

Best Pal lost his left front shoe and trainer Gary Jones, who wasn’t happy with the condition of the main track, said his star didn’t care for the surface.

“He was climbing. He didn’t pick it up at all,” Jones said. “They cut up the track this morning and he didn’t handle it.

“When you lose a shoe, you’ve got to be careful. He lost the shoe on the only foot he hadn’t had trouble with before.”

Desormeaux had no problem with the surface, adding that he won’t try the same tactics the next time the California-bred draws the No. 1 post, as he did Saturday.

“Our main concern was to get him to the outside leaving the gate, take a hold of him, find running room and then worry about the race,” he said. “From now on, if he draws the inside we’ll work with it instead of running and hiding from it, especially with Best Pal. (Being inside) is not such a problem with him as it was when he was younger.

“He traveled well enough. He just didn’t have the finish. He needed the race, and he could have been right up on the pace. Best Pal picked it up on the backside, but so did the rest of the field. It was asking too much of him.”

Provided he comes out of the Big ‘Cap well, Best Pal probably will defend his title in the Oaklawn Handicap next month. That was his last victory.

“It would have worked out better if we had just let him run his race,” owner John Mabee said of the concern about Best Pal’s inside post. “You need luck in any race. Today, we had the shoe, we were too far back off a slow pace and we wound up (very wide) for the stretch run.”

If Best Pal was a disappointment, Bertrando, the 2-1 second choice coupled with Marquetry, was even more so. After getting away with some slow fractions on the lead, as he had when beaten at 3-10 in the Charles H. Strub Stakes, the Skywalker colt finished ninth, beating only Tel Quel and June’s Reward.

“He didn’t even come close to running his race, and I don’t know why,” jockey Chris McCarron said.

Leger Cat rallied inside under Corey Nakatani to beat favored Luthier Enchanteur by 1 1/4 lengths in the $115,800 Arcadia Handicap.

Outrun early after breaking from the outside in the field of 12, the 8-1 shot overtook the runner-up in the final furlong and won in 1:34 for the mile on turf.

Horse Racing Notes

Making her first start since Oct. 24, Bountiful Native picked up where she left off with a head victory over Freedom Cry in the $100,950 Las Flores Breeders’ Cup Handicap. . . . Unbeaten Likeable Style is the 7-5 morning-line favorite to win her fourth in a row in the $219,200 Santa Anita Oaks today. Eliza, the Eclipse Award winner as the nation’s top 2-year-old filly, is the 9-5 second choice in her first start since she won the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies on Oct. 31. . . . Eddie Delahoussaye won twice Saturday and is within two victories of 5,000.