Espinoza gave Stellar Wind the ride to beat Beholder

7:38 PM ET

Instead of agonizing over why Beholder was unable to win her ninth straight race Saturday in the Clement L. Hirsch Stakes at Del Mar, the proper thing to do is to give credit to Stellar Wind, who engineered this half-length upset. She richly deserves it.

Simply put, Stellar Wind ran demonstrably better than Beholder on Saturday. That doesn’t mean Stellar Wind is now demonstrably better than Beholder, because it will take more meetings between these two to prove that, and won’t we be lucky to witness these two terrific horses hash that out? But on this day, Stellar Wind was better, and here’s why:

Stellar Wind is a stalker/closer type performer. Beholder has much more positional speed. Beholder held an enormous pace advantage in the Hirsch on paper, and to let that advantage play out in the actual running would have been tantamount to conceding the race.

With that in mind, much credit goes to Stellar Wind’s connections and especially her jockey, Victor Espinoza, for taking Stellar Wind out of the comfort zone of her established running style, and not just allowing Beholder her giant paper tactical advantage. Espinoza hustled Stellar Wind out of the gate, niggled on her down the backstretch, and hard-sent her midway on the far turn, all just to stay on Beholder’s flank and apply as much pressure as they could. And all the while, Beholder was running as easy as you please, setting fractions that were completely unremarkable.

Stellar Wind ran hard every step of the Hirsch’s 1-1/16 miles, so it speaks volumes to her quality that she was still able to prevail. Then again, her Hirsch win was, as upsets of 1-10 shots go, more a surprise, and not as severe as a …

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