LAS PALMAS HANDICAP : Nikishka Is Tonic for Delahoussaye

Eddie Delahoussaye is getting well. Antibiotics and fast horses have been the answer.

Delahoussaye gets the antibiotics from his doctor, the horses from trainers such as Jerry Fanning and Joe Cannon. On Saturday, riding Fanning’s Present Value for the first time, Delahoussaye brought the 5-year-old home a winner in the Goodwood Handicap at Santa Anita.

On Sunday, Cannon turned Nikishka over to Delahoussaye and he rode the 4-year-old filly to a 3 1/2-length victory in the $164,300 Las Palmas Handicap, with the 4-5 favorite, Claire Marine, finishing fourth in the seven-horse field.

“The way I’ve been doing, maybe I should stay sick,” Delahoussaye said.

The 38-year-old jockey is the leading rider for the Oak Tree season, and Sunday’s victory gave him victories in half of the 10 stakes that have been run, but on Thursday he called in sick.

“I must have caught some kind of a bug that’s going around,” Delahoussaye said Sunday. “I thought he (the doctor) might give me a shot, but instead he put me on antibiotics.”

Both of Delahoussaye’s weekend stakes winners beat odds-on favorites, Present Value upsetting Rahy on Saturday. Present Value’s victory gave Delahoussaye an extra reason to be at Gulfstream Park on Breeders’ Cup day on Nov. 4. He’ll ride that horse in the Classic and he also has mounts on Pleasant Tap in the Juvenile, Political Ambition in the Mile, Gorgeous in the Distaff and Prized in the Turf Stakes.

Delahoussaye has won only one Breeders’ Cup race--on Princess Rooney in 1984--out of 24 mounts.

“None of my horses this year will be favored, but in those races you never know,” Delahoussaye said. “There’s so much money ($10 million in purses for the seven-race program) that you can still do pretty good just by hitting the board.”

Chris McCarron, Claire Marine’s jockey, had a reason to fear Nikishka in the Las Palmas, because before this year he had been the only rider the Nijinsky II-Bendara filly ever had. McCarron, who won three in a row before the Las Palmas Sunday, broke Nikishka’s maiden at Del Mar in September of 1988. He also won two more races with her before she was taken out training for about six months because of a bleeding problem.

“When I saw Nikishka at Del Mar this year, she impressed the daylights out of me,” McCarron said. “When she ran last time, I thought she’d beat Brown Bess.”

Brown Bess, Northern California’s grass star, beat Nikishka by a length in the California Jockey Club Handicap at Bay Meadows on Oct. 7. That was only Nikishka’s third time on grass.

Claire Marine began Sunday with a chance to be voted the best female turf horse in the country, having won six of nine starts this year and five of her last six, but now she must recoup in the Yellow Ribbon in two weeks in order to re-enter the picture.

“I can’t offer any excuse,” McCarron said. “She seemed comfortable on the turf (wet from rain but still considered firm). I wasn’t concerned until we hit the three-sixteenths pole. Nikishka was responding and my filly wasn’t.”

No Review finished second, a half-length ahead of Agirlfromars, and it was another 1 1/4 lengths back to Claire Marine, whose entrymate, Delighter, finished sixth.

Nikishka earned $96,800 for his owner and breeder, Aaron Jones. The crowd of 24,175 made her the second betting choice and she paid $8.20, $4.60 and $3.60. No Review paid $5.40 and $4 and Agirlfromars paid $4.40.

Horse Racing Notes

Rahy strained a ligament in his left foreleg while running second in the Goodwood Handicap and will be sidelined indefinitely. . . . Trainer Jerry Fanning will start Pleasant Variety in the Breeders’ Cup Turf in addition to running Present Value in the Classic. . . . Jockey Pat Valenzuela’s first drug test came back negative and he was given another test by the stewards Sunday. He hopes to resume riding on Thursday. . . . On the Menu, ridden by Corey Black, was disqualified after winning the fourth race. The colt came out at the top of the stretch and bumped Ole’, who stumbled and threw his jockey, Luis Ortega. Ortega was excused from the rest of his mounts but didn’t suffer any serious injuries.