US racing tips: Shane Ketteridge with two selections from Santa Anita

Bullard
9.33 Santa Anita
1pt win

Irish Wahine
11.40 Santa Anita
1pt each-way

Bob Baffert has won the Grade 2 San Vicente Stakes on 13 previous occasions, including four of the last five, and his duo of Barnes and Romanesque are to be feared.

However, this can go to the Michael McCarthy-trained colt, Bullard, who has been impressive in two starts.

This son of Gun Runner showed a maturity beyond his years when rallying to win by a length and a quarter on debut over 6f at Del Mar in September.

He returned to Del Mar in November to step up to 7f in the Grade 3 Bob Hope Stakes and turned out an easy winner by four and three-quarter lengths under a hand ride from Umberto Rispoli, who takes the ride again here.

Bullard has been putting in some solid workouts at this course in recent weeks and looks to be a colt with ambitions of lining up in the Kentucky Derby on the first weekend in May.

The penultimate contest at Santa Anita is the Grade 3 Las Flores Stakes for fillies and mares, taking place over a 6f trip on the dirt course, and it’s the oldest mare in this field, Irish Wahine, who gets the vote.

Given her abundance of experience around the twists and turns of Santa Anita, Librado Barocio’s evergreen six-year-old looks to have been overlooked as she has won six of her eleven starts here.

The trip will suit her and she has enough ability to give the two short-priced Bob Baffert runners a scare, so it would not surprise should Kyle Frey take her forward early into her favoured prominent style of running from which she could at least split the Baffert pair.

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