By Dennis Box
Editor
It was a girl’s night out Sunday when 2-year-old filly Blazinbeauty beat the boys in the $65,000 Gottstein Futurity at Emerald Downs.
The closing day of the meet featured the 76th running of the 2-year-old stakes race at 1-1/16 miles, which is usually won by thoroughbred colts or geldings.
Blazinbeauty was 6-to-1, the second favorite behind the previously unbeaten So Lucky at 1-to-9.
So Lucky, a Washington-bred colt by Coast Guard out of Miss Pixie, came into the race with four wins and was attempting to sweep the 2-year-old colts and geldings stakes division.
Blazinbeauty had one win in three starts. The filly found her first victory photo Aug. 7 in the 6 furlongs, $50,000 Barbara Shinpoch stakes at Emerald Downs.
Blazinbeauty became the only the third filly to win the Gottstein Futurity in 20 years at Emerald Downs and the 13th in the 76 years of the Gottstein.
The filly is trained by Enumclaw resident Frank Lucarelli, a five-time leading trainer at the Auburn oval. Jockey Isaias Enriquez was in the irons and she is owned by Darrin Paul from Bothell.
Like the Shinpoch stakes, Blazinbeauty came from off the pace to grab the win.
During the Gottstein the filly broke from the second postposition and settled in about fifth place as So Lucky set early fractions of 22.61 seconds, 45.66. Blazinbeauty was a far as nine lengths back after the first turn.
By the far turn Enriquez began to let Blazinbeauty move into position for a stretch run.
“I wanted to put my horse in the clear and just waited and waited,” Enriquez said. “When it was time to go, she just kept getting closer and closer. I thought we could win it at the quarter-pole. She had so much horse and I hadn’t even asked her yet.”
When Enriquez did ask her she flew past So Lucky on the outside winning by six lengths.
Rocco Bowen rode So Lucky for trainer Howard Belvoir. Bowen said he had hoped to save some ground with So Lucky and get him to relax
“I was trying to slow him down early but I didn’t want to slow him down too much and get him behind horses,” Bowen said. “He’s such a good horse. I know he can go two turns. At the top of the lane, I knew he was getting tired. I was just hoping and praying I could keep him together, but I couldn’t get the job done.”
Blazinbeauty paid $14, $2.80 and $2.20 and improved her overall record to 2-2-0 with $81,575 in earnings. The Kentucky-bred by Tale of Ekati out of Rockport Beauty earned $40,750 for Sunday’s win. The filly was honored as Emerald Downs’ Top 2-Year-Old Filly.
So Lucky earned $16,500 to increase his total to $103,835 for owners Pegasus Too and Rising Star Stable. So Lucky compiled a 4-1-0 record in five starts, and was voted the meet’s Top 2-Year-Old and Top Washington-Bred. Belvoir trained two of the meet’s top four earners – Barkley with $110,775 in earnings and So Lucky. He led all trainers with seven stakes wins.
