Edited Dubai Racing Club Report
Following her half-mile workout March 23, two-time champion Indian Blessing walked the quarantine barn area Tuesday morning in preparation for the $2-million Dubai Golden Shaheen (UAE-I), Sponsored by Gulf News, Saturday night at Nad Al Sheba in Dubai.
The 4-year-old daughter of Indian Charlieemerged from the drill in excellent condition, according to Bob Baffert's assistant trainer Jimmy Barnes.
“She had a nice walk this morning and she looks really good,” Barnes said.
Indian Blessing, Hal and Patti Earnhardt’s homebred filly, was named champion female sprinter of 2008 on the heels of her 2-year-old filly championship campaign. In her last start, the daughter of Shameful, by Flying Chevron, won the seven-furlong La Brea Stakes (gr. I) at Santa Anita.
Barnes was not sure how to evaluate Indian Blessing’s competition in the six-furlong race, but he spent part of Tuesday trying to get a look at some of the other sprinters in the race while observing from the backstretch.
Trainer Akio Adachi who arrived in Dubai this morning was at Nad Al Sheba to watch his Golden Shaheen hope on the main track. Bamboo Ere beat the top Japanese dirt horse Success Brocken in the JBC Sprint (Jpn-I) last November, but he was fifth in the Negishi Stakes (Jpn-III) before finishing eighth in the February Stakes (Jpn-I) last time out.
“This is his first time race over a straight course, and we do not have anything like the straight course on dirt at the training center in our country,” Adachi said. “So it is good for us to experience training over the course at Nad Al Sheba before the Saturday’s race.
“He has settled in very well since he arrived,” he continued. “I have contacted my stable staff every day, and they told me he was in very good shape. He likes the hot weather and keeps his good condition so far. I am very honored to be able to compete in this fantastic Dubai World Cup meeting.”
Trainer Brian Koriner decided not to work Black Seventeen who is at Nad Al Sheba to run in the Golden Shaheen. Instead, the 5-year-old son of Is It True jogged the wrong around the main dirt track.
Koriner said Black Seventeen is exhibiting signs of lethargy, a likely result of the trip from California last week.
“He’s kind of flat and rather than knock him out today by working him, we are hoping that he will snap-to in the next day,” Koriner said. “I’m a little bit concerned.”
Koriner, who arrived in Dubai the evening of the 23rd, said exercise rider Colleen Hartford told him the horse was perky the last couple of days.
“But this morning, I saw him in the barn, and just decided to leave the work alone,” Koriner said.
Out of the Strike the Anvil mare Fuzzy Navel, Black Seventeen won last year’s Vosburgh Stakes (gr. I) for Wind River Stables, Janet Lyons, and Koriner. In all, he has a 4-2-3 slate from 13 career starts. He ran third in his Golden Shaheen prep, the Jan. 11 Mr. Prospector Stakes (gr. III) at Gulfstream Park.
Last year Koriner saddled Barbecue Eddie to a fourth-place finish in the Dubai Golden Shaheen.
“Eddie never had a bad day last year leading up to the race,” Koriner said.
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