With Monmouth Park handing out $1 million a day in purses and luring top runners to the track, few horses can expect class relief when they head to the Jersey Shore this summer. But Florida-bred Dances With Ashley, fresh off her first Grade 1 race, surely will welcome a dip in class when she starts in the $100,000 Dearly Precious Stakes on Friday.
Dances With Ashley, a daughter of Journeyman Stud stallion Wildcat Heir, stretched out to a mile for the Acorn Stakes (G1) at Belmont Park in June and finished a disappointing 11th after breaking in the air and chasing the field along the rail. After the race, the filly was transferred from trainer Marty Wolfson to Bruce Levine, who has chosen to return her to sprinting for the six-furlong Dearly Precious.
“When I took over her training duties, we started from scratch,” Levine said. “In her last race, she broke in the air and then was down inside, and at Belmont, that can be tough. The inside that day wasn’t the place to be at all, and she was playing catch up. And she shipped in for the race even though the connections had told me that she wasn’t doing all that great, so to me, it was a total throw-out race.”
Levine is hoping Dances With Ashley reverts to the form that made her a two-time stakes winner this year. The filly rallied for a 2 ½-length score in the fillies’ division of the $50,000 OBS Sprint Stakes in Ocala in February, then won by four lengths against Florida-breds in the $85,000 Stonehedge Farm South Sophomore Fillies Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs in April.
Dances With Ashley, bred by Brambly Lane Farm in Sparr and Steve Dwoskin, has won four of her six starts for $114,298, with her only two losses coming in graded events. She made her graded stakes debut in the Old Hat Stakes (G3) at Gulfstream in January, finishing ninth. Prior to that, she broke her maiden at first asking on the grass at Calder Casino & Race Course in November and captured an allowance on the main track in Miami the following month.
Levine said he plans to keep Dances With Ashley in sprints, but he has plenty of options for her since she’s run well on turf and the synthetic surface at OBS.
“I think she wants to sprint, maybe even a sprint on the grass,” he said. “That’s another option down the road. She’s versatile. She does everything right. She’s nice to be around, a real sweetheart, and she’s really professional.”
Elvis Trujillo, who piloted Dances With Ashley to her stakes win at Tampa Bay Downs, will be aboard the filly Friday when she breaks from the No. 2 post in a field of eight sophomore fillies.
The field also includes Happy Week, Beyondallboundarys, Vindy City, Southern Truth, Simply Spiteful, Whoopi Kitten and Offlee Blessed.
Offlee Blessed is undefeated in three starts, including a win in a $60,900 allowance at Woodbine last month, and will be making her stakes debut.
Whoopi Kitten broke her maiden at first asking, then was the runner-up to Greeley’s Rocket in the $94,000 Crank It Up Stakes at Monmouth last month.
Vindy City won the $51,000 Miss Preakness Stakes at Pimlico in May but most recently was sixth in the $200,000 Jostle Stakes at Philadelphia Park last month. The daughter of Vindication turned in a bullet workout in Philly on July 13, breezing a half-mile in 46 3⁄5 seconds.
Southern Truth won the $75,000 Small Wonder Stakes at Delaware Park last summer but has gone winless in five subsequent stakes races.
Simply Spiteful won a $50,000 optional claimer at Belmont on July 11, and Beyondallboundarys and Happy Week finished first and second in a $52,864 allowance at Churchill Downs last out.
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– Photo of Florida-bred Dances With Ashley by Jim Lisa
