Dash for Speed to Make Season Debut at Los Alamitos

Two-time champion Dash for Speed will make her seasonal debut at the Horsemen’s Quarter Horse Racing Assn. meet Saturday night at Los Alamitos when she opposes five rivals in the $25,000 added Charger Bar Handicap. The Charger Bar is for fillies and mares and will be contested at 350 yards as the ninth race on the 12-race program.

The Blane Schvaneveldt-trained Dash for Speed looks to be the odds-on choice in the Charger Bar. The 5-year-old mare has won 21 of 27 lifetime starts and boasts earnings of $1,093,441. Dash for Speed is 2-for-2 in 1990, winning the Anne Burnette Invitational and the Los Alamitos Championship Invitational this summer.

Variety Road, which has come back from a nasty spill and two seasons at stud to continue a successful racing career, can boost his earnings above the $1-million mark Saturday when he heads the field in the $300,000 California Cup Classic at Santa Anita Park.

The Classic will be run at 1 1/8 miles and be the richest event of the inaugural California Cup, a day of seven stakes for California-breds with purses totaling $1 million. First post time will be at noon, half an hour earlier than usual.

Variety Road, a 7-year-old horse owned by Kjell Qvale of San Francisco, has won 15 of 47 lifetime starts for earnings of $857,465 and would become the 12th Cal-bred to reach the $1-million milestone.