On Leave entered Thursday’s Riskaverse Stakes without a stakes win on her resume. In fact, the $100,000 race was her first try in stakes company in her fifth start. While six others in the field came in off recent graded stakes tries – Pricedtoperfection, Thrilled, Marquee Miss, Enjoy Yourself, and Baciami Piccola and Sky My Sky – On Leave entered off a 1 3/4-length victory in an allowance-optional at Belmont Park July 17.
“Pretty good (field), but this is a pretty good race, it always has been,” trainer Shug McGaughey said. “When she won the a-other than it was a pretty solid bunch and I was pretty impressed with the way she ran that day. Watching her train since she got up here, she’s trained great. She wasn’t a stakes winner, so I elected to run her in here instead of running her in the Lake Placid to try to win a stakes with her and hopefully we can go on from there.”
When the latch sprung in the 1-mile turf stakes, On Leave stumbled and cost her and rider Jose Ortiz valuable position in the run for the first turn. She took up position in eighth early, but had to check entering the first turn, tossing her head and going wide as she avoided clipping heels.
“I just think he got into a couple predicaments where he was down in there trying to get position and they were pulling back a little bit. He just had to check her a couple times,” McGaughey said after the race.
To read the rest of the Riskaverse recap, download Friday’s digital edition of The Saratoga Special presented by Keeneland Sales.
