I normally don’t post about finishing second but I was really thrilled with the progress of this mare. When I arrived in Florida I thought she would do well but I had a lot of concerns as to what classes she would fit down here. I had assumed as I was unloading the truck that she was going to be racing in a lot of conditioned claiming events for non-winners of x races. The rest of my barn had issues of getting acclimated to the Florida weather and life on the track as opposed to a quiet farm. But Ditto (our nickname for her) blossomed right away. She has had 13 starts at Pompano with 4 Wins, 2 Seconds and 1 Third; She has only missed 2 checks down here this winter. She has built a reputation as a hard closer.
On Sunday night she earned a spot in the Fillies and Mares Open starting out of the five hole against 6 other Open mares. She got away near the back of the pack and the front runners were only setting a moderate pace for this class hitting the 1/2 in 57.0 seconds, which is about 2 seconds slower than normal. Usually at Pompano when the pacesetter is allowed to back down the pace like this it gives the horses on the front end a big advantage as they come out of the 1/2 mile turn and accelerate away from the field leaving too much distance and speed for the trailing horses to overcome. But Ditto raced an incredible last half in 55.1, tipping 3 wide coming out of the final turn covering the last quarter in an incredible 26.3.
Here is a USTA article on the race, http://xwebapp.ustrotting.com/absolutenm/templates/article.aspx?articleid=57541&zoneid=63, and the video: