Gal About Town Puts Unbeaten Streak on the Line in Sunday's Pocahontas

Oct 25, 2012 Travers Manley

Iroquois Racing Club LLC’s Gal About Town, unbeaten and untested in her first two career starts, will face seven rivals in Sunday’s 44^th running of the Grade II, $150,000-added Pocahontas at one mile on the main track at Churchill Downs.

The Pocahontas, a “Road to the Kentucky Oaks” Prep Season race, is co-featured with the $100,000-added Iroquois (GIII) on Sunday’s “Stars of Tomorrow I” program, which features racing exclusively for 2-year-olds and kicks off the 21-day Fall Meet at Churchill Downs. The Top 4 finishers in the Pocahontas will receive 10-4-2-1 points, respectively.  

The Pocahontas is scheduled as Race 8 on the 11-race program and has a post time of 4:05 p.m. (all times Eastern). Post time for the first race is 12:40 p.m.  

A chestnut daughter of City Zip, Gal About Town bested a field of 10 at Monmouth Park by 3 ¼ lengths in her career debut. She followed up that performance with an equally-impressive score against allowance company at Keeneland. Gal About Town, who will be saddled by Jay Severs prior to testing stakes company for the first time, will break from the outside in post eight under Jesus Castanon. 

Gal About Town’s main rivals could be Sheldon Nitenson’s Danalake, Claiborne Farm and Adele Dilschneider’s Sign and Evelyn and Darrell Yates’ La Song.

Danalake, trained by Todd Pletcher, is the lone stakes winner in the field and has yet to be worse than second in her short career. She will break from post four under Julien Leparoux, a two-time winner of the Pocahontas.

The Al Stall Jr.-trained Sign is the least experienced filly of the bunch, but she made her one start count and took a maiden special weight event at Saratoga by 11 ¾ lengths under Rosie Napravnik, who will be aboard the filly again Sunday when they break from post six.

Prior to finishing eighth in the Darley Alcibiades (GI) at Keeneland, La Song finished just a neck behind Gold Edge in the Arlington-Washington Lassie (GIII) at Arlington Park. The Wayne Catalano-trained filly will break from post two under Corey Lanerie.

Another filly with stakes experience is Live Oak Plantation’s Seasoned Warrior. The Bill Mott-trained Seasoned Warrior broke her maiden at Saratoga in August and then ran fourth behind So Many Ways in the Spinaway (GI). In her most recent start, Seasoned Warrior ran third behind Kauai Katie in the Matron (GII) at Belmont Park. She will break from the rail in the Pocahontas under Joel Rosario.

The field for the Pocahontas, from the rail out, is as follows: Seasoned Warrior (ridden by Rosario, 118 pounds), La Song (Lanerie, 118), Cloudy in Sandiego (Terry Thompson, 118), Danalake (Leparoux, 120), Brotherhood Singer (Jon Court, 118), Sign (Napravnik, 118), Cloudy Vow (Shaun Bridgmohan, 118) and Gal About Town (Castanon, 118).  

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