Precisionist Seeks Series Sweep : Rival Trainers Believe Speedster Can Be Beaten in $300,000 Strub Stakes

Of the four horses that will oppose Precisionist in Sunday’s $300,000 Charles H. Strub Stakes at Santa Anita, three were soundly beaten by the 4-year-old colt two weeks ago and the fourth, a gelding named Halo Folks, has never run in a stakes race or ever gone farther than a mile.

Yet rival trainers believe that Precisionist is vulnerable as he tries to become the fifth horse to sweep the Strub series.

“They beat Man o’ War, didn’t they?” chortled Charlie Whittingham, who trains Greinton. “This horse (Precisionist) has been beaten before, too.”

But not lately. Precisionist, who was bred by his owner, 87-year-old Fred Hooper of Ocala, Fla., won the first leg of the Strub series, the Malibu Stakes, by 2 3/4 lengths Dec. 26. On Jan. 19, he added the San Fernando Stakes, finishing four lengths ahead of Greinton.

The last horse to sweep the Malibu, the San Fernando and the Strub, which was called the Santa Anita Maturity before 1963, was Spectacular Bid in 1980. The others before him were Round Table in ‘58, Hillsdale in ’59 and Ancient Title in ’74. Round Table and Spectacular Bid used their sweeps as springboards to horse-of-the-year titles.

Besides Greinton and Halo Folks, Precisionist’s other challengers in the 1-mile race Sunday are Gate Dancer and Tsunami Slew. Gate Dancer, the Preakness winner who nipped Precisionist at the wire in last year’s Super Derby, came from last to finish third in the San Fernando, which is an eighth of a mile shorter than the Strub. Tsunami Slew was fourth, 12 1/2 lengths behind Precisionist, in the San Fernando.

No one challenged Precisionist as he ambled to a slow-paced, early lead in the San Fernando, something that had Hooper, trainer Ross Fenstermaker and jockey Chris McCarron counting their purse money before the horses even reached the stretch.

“It looked like there were horses who would go with us early, but nobody did,” Fenstermaker said. “If somebody had said before the race that they’d run the first half mile in :47, you would have laughed at him.”

Greinton, a French-raced colt who made his first start on dirt, stumbled as he left the gate or jockey Bill Shoemaker might have had him closer. Whittingham won’t tip his hand on what strategy he might use in the Strub.

“My horse can lay close or be in the back,” Whittingham said. “The weights won’t hurt us. We’ve got 117 and Precisionist carries 125, which is a nice spread to have on your side in a mile-and-a-quarter race.”

Under conditions based on earnings, Gate Dancer is the Strub high weight at 126 pounds, and he’ll be ridden once more by Laffit Pincay, who was back at Santa Anita Friday for the first time since his wife’s suicide Jan. 20. Pincay was replaced by Pat Day in the San Fernando.

Low weight in the Strub is Halo Folks, whose 115-pound assignment is one of the reasons trainer Bruce Headley entered. “That and the fact that last time out (Jan. 21) he ran a good race (losing by a neck) against Hula Blaze,” Headley said. “Hula Blaze came back a few days later to win a $100,000 race (the San Pasqual Handicap).”

Halo Folks was undefeated before the loss to Hula Blaze, having won two races last fall at the Oak Tree meeting and adding two more this season at Santa Anita.

Halo Folks didn’t race as a 2-year-old. “I go slowly with my younger horses, and he had colds and some typical things that held him back,” Headley said. “A year ago at Santa Anita, he worked in 1:12 out of the gate, but after that it looked like he might be starting to bow (a tendon). He went to the farm (part-owner Buddy Johnston’s Old English Rancho in Ontario) until I got him back last summer at Del Mar.”

Eddie Gregson, who trains Tsunami Slew, is glad to see Halo Folks running. “The horse looks like he only knows how to run one way, with a lot of speed, so maybe he’ll go with Precisionist early,” Gregson said. “I know one thing--if you let Precisionist go by himself to the far turn, it’s all over. If it’s not somebody else’s horse, it’s gotta be my horse who’s with him by that stage.”

Horse Racing Notes All five starters will share in the Strub purse. Fifth place is worth $7,500. It’s costing each owner $3,100 to get into the race. . . . It’s the smallest Strub field since three horses faced Spectacular Bid in 1980. . . . Jockey Chris McCarron believes that there could be a flaw in trying to push Precisionist early. “If another horse challenges him, he might use himself up to do it,” McCarron said. . . . Trainer Ross Fenstermaker gives no guarantees that Precisionist will be on the lead. “If that other horse (Halo Folks) goes out there, we could lay back,” he said. “Some races, you just wait and see what happens when the bell rings.”

Fali Time is not running in the Strub after registering a low blood count following his fifth-place finish in the San Fernando. . . . In the draw, Halo Folks got the inside post, and after him it’s Gate Dancer, Tsunami Slew, Greinton and Precisionist. Pat Valenzuela will ride Halo Folks, Eddie Delahoussaye has Tsunami Slew and Bill Shoemaker will be on Greinton. . . . Bill Allen, one of the owners of Breeders’ Cup Classic winner Wild Again, said the horse will miss the Santa Anita Handicap and should be ready for Hollywood Park. Wild Again has a quarter crack and has been fitted with a bar shoe.

Included in the nine-horse field in Sunday’s $250,000 El Camino Real Derby at Bay Meadows are Right Con, Tank’s Prospect and Skywalker, who finished 3-4-5 in the Hollywood Futurity. . . . Wesley Ward, the New York jockey who will be in Los Angeles next Friday night to accept his Eclipse Award as 1984’s outstanding apprentice, may ride a few horses that day at Santa Anita. . . . Trainer Jack Van Berg, whose far-flung barn numbers a couple of hundred horses, had a typical day Friday. He left his farm in Kentucky in the morning, stopped off in Omaha, Neb., to check some stock, then arrived in Los Angeles Friday night. He’ll saddle Gate Dancer in the Strub.