Jeremiah Englehart sensed that something – maybe a sudden movement, sound, anything – might unhinge an otherwise “kind” filly halfway through saddling before Thursday’s $100,000 Stillwater Stakes at Saratoga Race Course.
He knew it thanks to a lifetime around horses and some critical years working on the NYRA starting gate crew before taking out his trainer’s license. My Italian Rabbi, Englehart’s entrant in the 6-furlong stakes for New York-bred 2-year-old fillies, didn’t put her trainer in too much of a jackpot like those days on the gate. She did put enough weight on Englehart to almost pin him to the side of her No. 5 stall before being taken out in the open to the corner of the paddock near Shake Shack.
Englehart took the shank, gave her several turns around a few trees, let Juan Bernardini handle the saddling and all went calm.
“She’s a filly I can lay down in the stall with,” Englehart said. “She has that mentality where it doesn’t seem like anything bothers her. Except for the stall in the paddock today, I don’t know what that was all about.
“I figured if I don’t make any sudden moves they will do what they do; I just stood there because I didn’t want her to get any more startled than she was. I used to work on the starting gate so I’ve been in some pretty dicey situations before.”
Calm and unhampered from that point, My Italian Rabbi handled the rest of the preliminaries and her four opponents led by heavy favorite Fierce Lady to run her record to 2-for-2 for owner Al Gold and Englehart in the stakes named for the village located to the east of Saratoga Springs. My Italian Rabbi edged 2-5 favorite Fierce Lady by a nose after a long stretch battle, running the 6 furlongs under Luis Saez in 1:10.31.
To read the rest of the Stillwater recap, download Friday’s digital edition of The Saratoga Special presented by Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners.
