BY GULFSTREAM PARK PRESS OFFICE (Edited)
HALLANDALE BEACH, FL–St. Elias Stable LLC’s Rated by Merit has dazzled in the first two races of his promising career, but don’t look to be blinded by the undefeated, untested 2-year-old colt in the morning.
The homebred son of Battalion Runner has been installed as the 3-5 morning-line favorite for Saturday’s $200,000 FTBOA Florida Sire Stakes Affirmed at Gulfstream Park and will never be allowed to leave his race on the track during training hours.
While heavy rains last weekend may have disrupted the training schedules of other horses, Rated by Merit’s preparation for the second leg of the Florida Sire Stakes series was hardly inconvenienced.
“We wouldn’t have breezed any closer than 10 days to begin with. We had an opportunity to breeze 13 days out, but we decided he had done enough,” trainer Michael Yates said. “One of the things I’ve learned is that he doesn’t need to breeze fast all the time. We put more emphasis into his gallops, which keeps us from needing to breeze him as often and as fast.”
Rated By Merit, who earned a then-high 92 Beyer Speed Figure for his July 13 debut victory by nine-and-three-quarters lengths, has breezed only twice since he captured the first leg of the Florida Sire Stakes series with a six-and-a-quarer-length romp in the Florida Sire Stakes Dr. Fager on Sept. 7 when he earned a 93 Beyer number.
He breezed an easy half mile in :52.46 20 days following his most recent victory and came back to breeze a strong five furlongs in :59.76 a week later.
Yates is confident that Rated by Merit’s performance won’t be diminished by the added distance of the seven-furlong Affirmed or, looking ahead, the mile-and-a-sixteenth of the $300,000 In Reality, the Florida Sire Stakes final Nov. 30.
“I believe the two turns is actually better,” Yates said. “I think he’ll improve going two turns.”
While Rated by Merit will command the most attention, I’malwaysthinking will represent Yates in Saturday’s $200,000 Susan’s Girl, the second leg of the Florida Sire Stakes series for 2-year-old fillies.
Bred and owned by Yates’ Shadybrook Farm Inc., the daughter of Long On Value enters the seven-furlong stakes off an Aug. 30 debut victory for Florida-bred fillies at six-furlongs.
“I was pretty confident that she would run well. She had trained very well before her first race,” Yates said. “We got a little behind the eight ball, as far as the [Sire] Stakes go, because she got cast in her stall early on and scraped her legs up. It kind of set us back about a month. Otherwise, we felt we had the kind of horse that could have been competitive in the first leg.”
I’malwaysthinking is out of the Warrior’s Pride mare, Happy Shoes, who raced only once, finishing a troubled fifth on turf for Yates and a partner.
“That day when we ran her, she got into the temporary rail and got a puncture wound in her shoulder. It got infected and she got a lot of time off,” Yates said. “As it turned out, the partnership dissolved, and I kept her to breed.”
