Del Mar Picks | Graduation Stakes 2024

Nine 2-year-old male runners will face off Friday afternoon at Del Mar Thoroughbred Club in the 73rd edition of the Graduation Stakes, a five and a half-furlong spin for California-bred racehorses.

The race will carry a $100,000 purse and be one of eight Cal-bred stakes offerings the shore oval will present this summer. The races are part of a 35-race arrangement throughout the year at California racetracks worth a total of $4.45-million called the Golden State Stakes series.

First post for the Friday card will be 4 p.m. The Graduation is scheduled to go off at approximately 7 p.m.

The horse to beat in the Friday dash is Gary Barber’s colt named R Heisman, a son of Far From Over who’ll be making the fourth start of his young career. The bay was last out in the Everett Nevin Stakes at Pleasanton on July 7, a race he was favored to win, yet could only finish second after a troubled trip.

Trainer Peter Miller has once again signed on top rider Juan Hernandez to be the pilot and Del Mar new morning line maker, Jeff Siegel, has hung the horse a solid 6/5 favorite in the field. They’ll break from Post 3 in the dash.

Sharp-eyed handicappers will note that R Heisman is listed as a Kentucky-bred, which naturally leads to the question of what in the heck is he doing in a Cal-bred race? The answer is this:  The colt’s dam, Parisienne, was covered in Kentucky by Far From Over, a son of Blame. The mare “caught” (was in foal) and then was shipped to California where she had her foal the following February. Then, she was bred back to a California stallion. This is a rule the California Thoroughbred Breeders’ Association has had on the books for a while in its attempts to bring more good horses into the state.

The favorite’s chief rival Friday appears to be Griffin Stables, Lovingier and Sabesky’s Bodacious, a son of Smokem who was a handy winner of a four and a half-panel dash at Santa Anita on May 3. Subsequently, trainer Jorge Periban shipped his colt to Kentucky and tried him in the Bashford Manner Stakes at Churchill Downs on June 30 but, after showing speed into the stretch in the six-furlong feature, he fell back to be well beaten.

Bodacious has Hall of Fame rider Victor Espinoza in the irons Friday.