Good Samaritan rolled down the Saratoga stretch, passing both Kentucky Derby (G1) winner Always Dreaming and Preakness S. (G1) champ Cloud Computing to take Saturday’s $600,000 Jim Dandy S. (G2) at Saratoga.
Owned by the partnership of WinStar Farm, Head of Plains Partners, China Horse Club and SF Racing Group, Good Samaritan had never started on the dirt before Saturday, and his last-to-first stretch move was reminiscent of his turf outings.
As expected Always Dreaming took the lead early and was up as much as five lengths in the first half-mile, which went in a moderate :48.53. Good Samaritan was still about 10 lengths behind the leader after six furlongs, but kicked into gear with three furlongs to run, coming five-wide into the stretch.
In full flight, the bay Harlan’s Holiday colt surged past all four of his foes in mid-stretch, pulling away impressively in the final sixteenth to win by 4 ¾-lengths in 1:50.69 for the nine furlongs on the fast main track.
“I couldn’t be more pleased with the way he ran,” said winning Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott. “It was a terrific race for (Good Samaritan). The pace was a little bit slower than I thought it would be. I was a little concerned when they were going down the middle of the backside and they hung up the slow fractions. I was a little concerned about that. They did start to pick it up leaving the half-mile pole. He ran into a very slow pace and ran well.”
Since winning his debut on the Saratoga turf last August, Good Samaritan won the Summer S. (G2T) and placed in three other graded stakes. His record stands at 3-2-1 in seven starts with earnings of $767,616.
