IS ADVANCING STAR THE NEXT SUPERSTAR?
If Gary Stevens says a horse can run, rest assured that the horse can really run.
This is a jockey, after all, who has won 52 stakes races in 1995 -- including a mind-boggling 16 Grade I's -- and has a reputation as one of the game's most astute judges of ability.
On Saturday, Stevens rides Golden Eagle Farm's Advancing Star in the $250,000 Hollywood Starlet (Gr. I) for 2-year-old fillies. Advancing Star is undefeated in two starts including an easy 4-length victory under Stevens in the $100,000-added Maker's Mark on Nov. 18. Her winning times, 1:08 4/5 in her six-furlong maiden-breaker and 1:21 4/5 in the seven-furlong Maker's Mark, were about as fast as a 2-year-old filly can run.
In Saturday's mile and-a-sixteenth Starlet, Advancing Star, a Kentucky-bred by Soviet Star out of Fair Advantage, will race around two turns for the first time.
"She's such an easy mover and wastes so little energy that I don't think it's going to be a problem for her," Stevens said. "A lot of times you get that feeling from different horses running shorter, and you think they're doing things very, very easily, and I've had it backfire on me. It turns out when you ask them, they're already doing their best. I don't think that's the case with Advancing Star. She won as easily as I could let her win the other day (Maker's Mark).
"I have great respect for (trainer) Richard Mandella, and he seems to think that distance is not going to be a problem with this filly at all. He's trained her to go long since the beginning. I'm confident Richard has done what he has to do. So I've got all the confidence in the world that she is going to be able to handle this distance. Until she doesn't, I'm just going to take it for granted that she will, and I'm going to ride her with a lot of confidence as if she has done it before."
Stevens has ridden Advancing Star just once, but the filly clearly left an impression on the rider.
"I wasn't around when Landaluce was here," he said. "Obviously, she was a great filly. That's kind of what it's reminding me of here, the way people are talking about her. I'll just say that I've never ridden any 2-year-old -- colt or filly -- that gave me the feeling Advancing Star gave me in her last race. But what I try to do as a rider is not get too caught up in the moment because I know unfortunate things can happen to them at any time. They can change overnight.
"They were worried the last time I rode her about her mind . . . getting too rattled. That's probably going to be a concern throughout her career, at least her early career -- just keeping her mind on straight where she is enjoying what she is doing going over to the gate and not getting nervous.
"In my experience, a filly's second race is usually the worst of her career. They've raced one time, and they can get awfully excited for that second race. You've got to be able to try to keep it in check, and we were able to do that with her. So that was a very good sign."
COSMIC FIRE JOINS STARLET LINEUP
Pine Creek Ranch's Cosmic Fire, winner of a $34,000 allowance race here on
Dec. 3, has joined the lineup for Saturday's $250,000 Hollywood Starlet, trainer Mel
Stute said.
A Kentucky-bred by Capote out of Future Bright, Cosmic Fire has two wins and two seconds from six starts, and $84,600 in earnings. She broke her maiden by 6 1/2 lengths over Cara Rafaela at Del Mar on July 29, and then finished second to Batroyale in the Grade II Sorrento Stakes at Del Mar on Aug. 9.
In other Starlet developments:
* Advancing Star breezed four furlongs in :49 3/5 Tuesday at Hollywood Park.
* Cara Rafaela drilled five furlongs in :59 2/5 Monday at Santa Anita Park.
Probables for the 15th Hollywood Starlet: Cara Rafaela, Corey Nakatani; Chile Chatte, Alex Solis; Advancing Star, Gary Stevens; Wheatly Special, Chris McCarron, and Cosmic Fire, no rider.
HENNESSY IN RAPID DRILL FOR HOLLYWOOD FUTURITY
Bob and Beverly Lewis' Hennessy, the probable heavy favorite in Sunday's
$500,000 Hollywood Futurity, tuned up for the Grade I event with a smoking five furlong drill -- :58 4/5 -- Monday morning at Santa Anita Park.
Trainer D. Wayne Lukas, who saddles Hennessy in the Futurity, is on the verge of winning his 12th national earnings title in the last years. Through Dec. 10, Lukas had amassed $12,407,830, or nearly $1-million more than Bill Mott, the runner-up with $11,672,795.
In other developments:
The maiden Odyle worked five furlongs in 1:02 1/5, handily, Tuesday morning at Santa Anita.
And Kent Desormeaux, who won the 1994 Futurity on Afternoon Deelites, will ride Scholarship for trainer Walter Greenman.
Early probables for the 15th Hollywood Futurity: Odyle, Corey Nakatani; Tropicool, no rider; Hennessy, Gary Stevens; Exetera, Eddie Delahousasye; Ayrton S, Chris McCarron; Scholarship, Kent Desormeaux, and Matty G, Alex Solis.
STEVENS TO UNDERGO ARTHROSCOPIC SURGERY
Gary Stevens, the meet's leading rider with 25 wins, will undergo arthroscopic
surgery on his left knee Monday and will miss the final week of the Hollywood Autumn
Meeting and the first two weeks of the Santa Anita winter/spring meeting.
Stevens, 32, has torn cartilage in the knee, and a cyst that has developed on the cartilage that has leaked fluid directly onto nerves around the knee area.
"The knee has nagged at me the last two or three years, and it's consistently gotten worse," said Stevens, who had reconstructive surgery on his right knee in 1985. "I've been able to ride with it, but it's time for me to get it taken care of."
Dr. Jim Tibone is scheduled to perform the surgery.
The Running Horse (http://www.isd1.com/alauck)