When Street Sense veered in several times in the stretch of the Toyota Blue Grass Stakes (G1) on April 14, trainer Carl Nafzger attributed the colt’s nose defeat to a lack of focus. Nafzger saw no such mistakes on Tuesday when Street Sense worked a bullet five furlongs in :59 under regular jockey Calvin Borel at Churchill Downs.

“He was a different horse this morning,” Nafzger said. “He did everything perfect this morning.”

According to clockers, Street Sense covered the first furlong in :12.40, quarter-mile in :24.40, three furlongs in :36.40, and half-mile in :47.80. He galloped out six furlongs in 1:11.40.

“It was a good work,” Nafzger said. “He did it easy and that’s what we needed.”

Nafzger indicated that the Polytrack surface at Keeneland Race Course may have been a culprit in the erratic course that Street Sense took in the late stages of the Blue Grass.

Nafzger has also blamed Street Sense’s third-place finish in the Lane’s End Breeders’ Futurity (G1) last October on a lack of focus. Nafzger believes Street Sense would have won that race if he had not idled after reaching the lead near the eighth pole.

“Let’s put it this way: I don’t think [Polytrack] helps him any,” Nafzger said on Tuesday. “Sometimes you see a surface that will move a horse up. I don’t see that it helps him any. He gets over it okay, he just doesn’t seem to be as focused over it.”

Street Sense is much more familiar with Churchill, his home track and the site of his ten-length victory in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile (G1). Nafzger said the Blue Grass did not inspire him to make any major changes.

“I’m more worried about 19 other horses,” Nafzger said. “I’m not really worried about what he is going to do. You don’t change anything.

“When you get to a Grade 1 race with horses of that quality it is a jockeys’ race. You have done your part. You are done. You are finished. I don’t change the dimension of my horse. My horse’s dimension is where we have found he is most effective and we leave him in that dimension and let him do it from there.”

Jeff Lowe is a Thoroughbred Times staff writer
source www.thoroughbredtimes.com