With a relatively short turf prep race under his belt, Michael House's Big John B will attempt to repeat his 2016 victory in the $100,000 Tokyo City Cup (G3) April 2 at Santa Anita Park.
The 8-year-old Hard Spun gelding went through the motions in his 2017 debut, a 1 1/8-mile turf allowance March 9 at Santa Anita, where he finished a non-threatening fifth behind graded winner Prospect Park.
"He's always been a horse, ever since I've had him, where he kinda needs one," said trainer Phil D'Amato. "I think it was a nice prep and he's breezed great since that grass race, so we'll try to defend the title."
Also a two-time grade 2 winner on grass, Big John B has run on dirt just twice in 16 starts for D'Amato—he has 15 wins from 41 starts overall—but he's won them both. Before last year's victory in the 1 1/2-mile Tokyo City Cup, Big John B won the 2015 Cougar II Handicap (G3) at the same distance on dirt at Del Mar. His two grade 2 turf wins came in back-to-back editions of the 1 3/8-mile Del Mar Handicap in 2014-15.
BALAN: Big John B Closes for Tokyo City Victory
"Anywhere from at least a mile and a quarter to a mile and a half (is where he's best)," D'Amato said. "It's more the distance than the surface."
In the Tokyo City, however, Big John B will have to take on another multiple graded winner who has done his best work recently going 1 1/2 miles.
Hronis Racing's grade 1 winner Hard Aces hasn't done so well against better competition recently, but in his only start at 1 1/2 miles on dirt, he took the 2016 Cougar II. Also by Hard Spun, Hard Aces has two wins in 20 starts for trainer John Sadler—the Cougar II and the 2015 Gold Cup at Santa Anita (G1).
LEWYN: Hard Aces Too Tough in Cougar II
Another Cougar II winner—Irish Surf—is also entered in the Tokyo City Cup, but that Del Mar score came back in 2014, when the main track was synthetic. The Giant's Causeway horse trained by Dan Hendricks made four more starts in 2014, including a second-place run in the Las Vegas Marathon (G2), but didn't race from November of 2014 to March of 2017, when he finished sixth in the same turf allowance Big John B is exiting.
Rounding out the field is Beach View, an allowance winner for Levy Racing, the Sadler-trained, Hronis-owned allowance winner Infobedad, and four-time Argentine group 1 winner Hi Happy.
Santa Anita Park, Sunday, April 02, 2017, Race 8Entries: Tokyo City Cup S. (G3)
PP Horse Jockey Wgt Trainer M/L 1 1Beach View (MD) Stewart Elliott 120 Leonard Powell 5/1 2 2Infobedad (ARG) Tyler Baze 120 John W. Sadler 5/1 3 3Hi Happy (ARG) Tiago Josue Pereira 120 Felipe N Souza 5/2 4 4Irish Surf (KY) Flavien Prat 120 Dan L. Hendricks 12/1 5 5Big John B (FL) Rafael Bejarano 122 Philip D'Amato 8/5 6 6Hard Aces (KY) Santiago Gonzalez 124 John W. Sadler 7/2
