Thursday, October 23, 2008

AFTER MISSING BIG UPSET, CHRISTIANA’S HEAT HOLDS ON BY A NOSE

ARCADIA, Calif. (Oct. 22, 2008) – Christiana’s Heat, who just missed pulling off a 30-1 upset in her previous start, withstood the late challenge of Tripped the Light to prevail by a nose Wednesday and capture Oak Tree’s $59,020 allowance feature for fillies and mile at one-mile over Santa Anita’s turf course.

Sent off as the 2-1 second choice in Wednesday’s event following her near miss in the $150,000 California Cup Distaff Handicap on Oct. 5, Christiana’s Heat ran the distance in 1:35.17 with Michael Baze aboard.


The 4-year-old gray filly benefited from the wide positioning of the race rails, thus narrowing the turf course, while quickly racing into a contending position behind pace-setter Set of Wings.

She took the lead on the far turn and gamely held on as Tripped the Light closed fastest under jockey Rafael Bejarano. It was another three-quarters of a length back to Set of Wings in third with Joel Rosario in the saddle.

The winner paid $6.40, $3.80 and $3.40 in the field of eight. The prices on the runner-up were $6 and $4.40 while Set of Wings paid $10 to show.

Owned by Albert and Kathleen Mattivi, Christiana’s Heat was making her seventh start for trainer Steve Knapp and providing her second win for Knapp which was worth $38,200. The figure increased the lifetime earnings of the daughter of Unusual Heat to $206,432 from a career record of 4-6-2 in 19 starts.

Oak Tree offers an eight-race card on Thursday at Santa Anita, starting at 1 p.m., prior to Friday’s kickoff of the two-day Breeders’ Cup World Championships.

Comments (0)