Keeneland Notes - April 13

- Nergal, a French import making his first U.S. start, won the fifth at Keeneland on Friday with a dramatic late rally that seems a little hard to believe when you watch the replay on Cal Racing (or on the Keeneland site). It's one of those races that there comes a point at which I thought I was watching the wrong horse because there's no way this one could possibly win. Nergal lost ground and momentum swinging 5-6 wide coming into the turn, and at midstretch there seemed no way he could win. But he crept closer, albeit slowly, at least until he mounted a last minute surge. At which point it still seemed he had no shot. In fact, I've watched the replay several times, and I'm still not seeing him win!

But he was a nose winner in his first start since May, 2006. The race before was won by Arradoul, who hadn't been out since last June. The race afterwards was taken by Quasicobra, last seen at Saratoga, and very well-bet here for Biancone. It seems as if layoffs mean almost nothing anymore.

It was Bobby Frankel's Lemon Law who was the tough luck loser in the fifth, and it's his second agonizing loss in a row, this time as the 7-5 favorite. Whatsmore, he's now been involved in four straight nose decisions, and won the first two. I guess he likes to mix it up. For Frankel, it was the first of two narrow losses on the day, and the second one was the subject of an attempted betting coup in the tenth. First time starter Tight Spot, 5-1 in the morning line, was slammed to 3-2, and came into the race a long series of steady works. The $300,000, three-year old son of Distorted Humor got hung out three, even four wide on the final turn, surged to the lead, and looked home free until he until he also got nailed at the wire. Man, you just can't get beat by less than what each of these horses did.

To make matters worse for the horse's backers, the 10th race winner was a 27-1 shot, with Kent Desormeaux aboard. Markdale hadn't raced since September, yet another winner off a long layoff!

But one layoff horse who didn't win was Showing Up. Even though he seemed to blow the first turn a bit, losing ground at a point at which I thought he was going to fare just fine from his outside post, he ran less ground (15 feet) than winner Kip Deville, who was outside of him every step of the way, but just wouldn't quit. I kept waiting for Showing Up to draw away in the stretch, but it just didn't happen, as Dutrow's colt prevailed in a final quarter of 23:35. Was it because Showing Up was short? Or is Kip Deville (Kipling) getting really good at this time? Cornelio Velasquez said of Showing Up: "My horse ran big. He ran his race.” [Bloodhorse]

- Reader Alex mentioned One Hot Wish, the Wesley Ward-trained filly who won Thursday's baby race by 12, setting what is said to be a world record 48.87 seconds. Now comes word that she's been added to next week's juvenile sale. Her race might be the first pari-mutuel under tack show in history. (And in fact, she's not the only two-year old to run really fast over the Polytrack for the sale.)

One Hot Wish is by Bring the Heat (by Wish For A Jeanne), an In Excess stallion by Roar (Forty Niner) standing in California. Her second dam is a half to the Grade 1 winner Broom Dance, the dam of End Sweep.