 Scott Martinez photo/ story by Ty
Wyant - Los Alamitos Winter Derby
Kobe Wins Thrilling Winter Derby
Cypress, CA - Feb. 18, 2012 - In a game of inches, Mark and Mary
Parson’s homebred Kobe won the Grade 1, $200,000 Los Alamitos Winter
Derby in a blink.
Kobe didn’t make his grade 1 debut an easy task. Bumped and nearly
knocked off stride at the start, Kobe had every excuse to lose and
lose by a large margin. Yet, a patient jockey Cody Jensen allowed
him to find his stride and his determination got him a very narrow
nose win over even-money favorite and fastest qualifier Dinero.
“He got bumped around a bunch of times at the start and then he got
bumped again after that,” winning trainer Paul Jones said. “Horses
just don’t win races when that stuff happens to them. This horse ran
a tremendous race.”
Kobe rallied to a :19.969 time for the 400 yards and Shane O’Leary’s
Dinero raced to a :19.970 time. It was that close. Check My Thoughts
was right there in third with a :20.001 mark as the top seven
finishers were separated by three noses, two necks and head.
“That’s class,” Jensen said after the race. “You can’t teach heart.
He just has it.
“I have a lot of history with the Parsons and Paul Jones. I used to
ride Kobe’s mother, Rubiate, and she had that type of heart. That’s
how she used to fight. We thought she was going to a special runner,
but it didn’t work out that well. She still gave Kobe her heart.”
A son of Mr Eye Opener, Kobe was a horse with high expectations in
the Jones’ barn and he reached those grade 1 hopes with his Winter
Derby win. He finished third in his career debut and then won his
next three starts. He won his Kindergarten trial back in May and was
then off until November. He returned to win a conditioned allowance
race and score a one-half-length win in the Holiday Handicap before
finishing second behind by a neck behind Long Gone in his Winter
Derby trial.
Kobe came into the Winter Derby with $27,502 in earnings and picked
up $84,000 out of the Winter Derby purse.
Deniro came up short in the long photo-finish review, however showed
that he belongs at the grade 1 level in the three-year-old division.
As a juvenile, Deniro raced in the Northwest and posted two wins —
in a futurity consolation with a $3,439 purse and a $1,800 futurity
trial. He was a close second in the Firecracker Futurity and a
non-competitive fourth in the Far West Futurity.
Those credentials earned him 14-1 odds in his Winter Derby trial. He
far exceeded those long-shot expectations when he stood out in the
trials with an expanding one-length win and the fastest-qualifying
time of :19.518. He was then rewarded with even-money favoritism in
the Winter Derby.
The Desirio-sired Deniro joined the Ugo De La Torre barn at Los
Alamitos and was ridden by Adrian Loza.
Deniro earned $34,000 for his second place finish and has been
supplemented to the Grade 1, $1,000,000 (est.) Rainbow Derby and the
Grade 1 $2,300,000 (est.) All American Derby this summer at Ruidoso
Downs.
In NBA terms, Kobe is his namesake Kobe Bryant while Deniro is
Jeremy Lin, who rose from anonymity to a national name with a big
game. Kobe won this game, but not by much. Not much at all.
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