The anticipation of five Grade I races on Super Saturday is upon us and here are a few possibly unrecognized stats that are worth bearing in mind.

Bill Mott surged last week with 4 wins and now has a total of 5 out of 15 starts in the first 12 days. With Kent D on the bench the vet from Dakota has been mixing and matching his riders. Mott and Julien Leparoux have had a couple of winner’s circle photos taken so far. Mott now leads the earning parade with over $230,000.

Another trainer whose hard work is paying off this meet is William Badgett Jr. Out of his horses’ 8 starts 3 have won and another placed and for those of us who follow this type of thing, he is 2 for 4 on the turf.

Other conditioners of note include Rudy Rodriguez – 8 wins out of 21 starts and Barclay Tagg with 5 wins out of 20 starts.

After 12 racing days Ramon Dominguez continues to lead the jockey colony with 19 wins out of 81 starts and so far he hits the board at over 60 percent. Following in the win column is John Velazquez with 13 out of 70 starts and Rajiv Maragh with 12 wins out of 67 starts. David Cohen has 7 out of his 10 triumphs on the turf courses where he has raced a total of 25 times this meet.

Rajiv Maragh photo courtesy of NYRA

The only triple digit return on a $2 investment last week came on Thursday in the 7th when Catchapenny K. blew by the field at the eighth pole under apprentice rider Jason Garcia. We had seen the horse show that he belonged at Saratoga but was a major live long shot at 51.50/1. In hindsight, carrying only 107 lbs with the 10 lb bug allowance was a deciding factor in his fastest finish. 8 out of the other 9 horses carried between 116 and 120 lbs in the 25,000 claimer on the turf. Congratulations to Mr. Garcia and Robert Ribaudo on their respective first wins of the meet.