Cat Thief Sheds Tough-Luck Tag, Knocks Off General Challenge

For months and months, race after race, Cat Thief had traveled with the stigma of a horse that always runs hard but never wins.

That all changed Sunday at Hollywood Park as Cat Thief defeated 1-2 favorite General Challenge by a head in the $500,000 Swaps Stakes, the closest finish for the stake in 13 years.

Third in the Florida Derby, second in the Blue Grass, third in the Kentucky Derby--these were just some of the frustrations Cat Thief heaped on trainer Wayne Lukas this year. By the time Cat Thief had reached Kentucky, the jockey who rode him in Florida, Pat Day, concluded that Menifee was a better Triple Crown opportunity.

After a far-back, seventh-place finish in the Preakness, Lukas even went back in distance--shortening him from 1 3/16 miles to a mile--and fed him to older horses in the Metropolitan Handicap at Belmont Park.

The result was no more encouraging, but Lukas had one more card up his sleeve--California water and sunshine, and a run at Hollywood Park for the first time.

Day, who had finished second with Menifee in both the Derby and the Preakness, was back aboard Cat Thief for the Swaps Stakes.

Cat Thief’s third win in 15 starts came in his first race in nine months and ended a losing streak at eight races. Sunday’s victory worth $300,000, combined with a maiden win, one other stakes win and nine second- and third-place finishes, have sent owner-breeder William T. Young’s colt over the $1-million mark in earnings.

“It was a gutsy performance the last eighth of a mile,” Day said. “Much more so than what I’d gotten from him when I rode him earlier in the year. I made an excuse for him [in the Fountain of Youth], but in the Florida Derby, when push came to shove, he didn’t get it done. I felt like there was a little more there, and he just wasn’t giving it to me. Today he was tenacious. He was determined, and I don’t think if we’d have gone around two more times, the other horse was going to get by us.”

General Challenge’s loss completed an unfortunate weekend for trainer Bob Baffert and owners John and Betty Mabee, whose Excellent Meeting, a 2-5 favorite, ran second to Smooth Player in Saturday’s Hollywood Oaks.

“That was a horse race,” Baffert said of the Swaps. “The fans got their money’s worth, but I didn’t get mine. Who would have thought that Cat Thief would have run that way? He hadn’t won in a while, but he’s a good horse--he was third in the Derby. My horse had every chance to get by, but he couldn’t do it.”

With Lukas in Kentucky for the Keeneland yearling sales, assistant Greg Falk saddled the trainer’s fourth Swaps winner. Only Gary Jones had saddled as many Swaps winners as Lukas before Sunday. Cat Thief paid $7.60 to win, running 1 1/8 miles in 1:47 4/5. Walk That Walk finished third and Desert Hero was last.

Horse Racing Notes

David Flores, who rode General Challenge, was back a race later with Plicck to win the $250,000 Sunset Handicap by a neck over last year’s winner, River Bay. Plicck, who paid $39.60 for $2, gave trainer Ron McAnally his first win in the Sunset since John Henry in 1984. The one-two finishers both left by van after the race, Plicck going lame in his left foreleg and River Bay rupturing a ligament in his left foreleg. . . . Admire The Flag, winner of an earlier grass race, fractured his left foreleg and was removed by van. . . . In other stakes, Dixie Union, after winning his debut with a :56 3/5 five furlongs, beat Wayne Lukas’ Exchange Rate by 1 1/4 lengths in the $106,300 Hollywood Juvenile, and Love That Red won his second stake of the meet with a late move in the $100,000 Answer Do Stakes. . . . Champ’s Star is the 5-2 morning-line favorite as the Hollywood Park season ends today with the Robert K. Kerlan Memorial Handicap.