Tuesday, July 29, 2008

BLACK MAMBA COMMITS TO SUNDAY’S JOHN MABEE ON THE TURF

Black Mamba, at one point a candidate for Arlington Park's Grade I, $750,000 Beverly D. Handicap as well as Sunday's John C. Mabee Handicap at Del Mar, has been committed to the Grade I, $400,000 Mabee at 1 1/8 miles on the Jimmy Durante Turf Course.

Trainer John Sadler made it official this morning. Early last week, the trainer acknowledged that he was "leaning toward the Beverly D.," but he has decided to keep his 5-year-old New Zealand-bred daughter of Black Minnaloushe on the Del Mar grass with Garrett Gomez named to ride.


The potential field lost one of its stars today when trainer Jim Cassidy reported Diamond Diva, winner of three of four starts since coming to his barn from England, would not run in the Mabee. "Her feet are still hurting her," he said. She won Hollywood Park's Grade II CashCall Mile in her last start, defeating Ventura and Lady of Venice.

The others committed so far to the race are I Can See, trained by Steve Knapp, Cassidy's Passified and Solva, from the Ben Cecil camp. The Carla Gaines-trained Foxysox and Placid Lake, trained by Vladimir Cerin are both nominated to the Mabee and Saturday's Clement L. Hirsch on the main track, and neither has committed to either race yet.

Comments (0)