ARCADIA — It will be a new stage but an old plot when Santa Anita presents five stakes races on the inaugural California Crown card Saturday afternoon.

The California Crown, mixing racing for enhanced purses with live music by Shaboozey, Gryffin, Lil Yachty, Frank Walker and Zach Bia, and food and drink offerings from Delilah, Funke and Wally’s, is an attempt by Santa Anita operator 1/ST to draw a new audience to the track.

As on most big days in Southern California racing, Bob Baffert trains the horses to beat in the major main-track stakes, the $1 million California Crown Stakes, and Phil D’Amato trains most of the top contenders in the major turf-course stakes, the $750,000 John Henry Turf Championship and $200,000 City of Hope Mile.

By unofficial count, horses from Baffert’s barn have won 22 main-track stakes at Santa Anita, Del Mar and Los Alamitos in 2024, while no other trainer has won more than five, and horses saddled by D’Amato have won 18 grass-course stakes, while nobody else has won more than six. Both could soon add to those totals.

Baffert has 8-5 morning-line favorite National Treasure (Flavien Prat riding), 2-1 Muth (Juan Hernandez) and 6-1 Newgate in the California Crown Stakes, the 1⅛-mile race for 3-year-olds and up that has been a productive prep for the Breeders’ Cup Classic as the Goodwood and Awesome Again Stakes in seasons past.

Senor Buscador, Subsanador and Katonah complete the field, reduced to six horses when trainer John Sadler scratched would-be long shot Indepensible was scratched to run him in the Oklahoma Derby at Remington Park on Sunday.

National Treasure won the Preakness in 2024 and the $3 million Pegasus World Cup at Gulfstream Park in January but is hard to rely on because he runs his share of dull races. His latest was a sixth-place finish in the muddy-track Whitney at Saratoga last month. He ran fourth in the “wet-fast” Awesome Again a year ago.

“He just didn’t bring his A game, didn’t get away (from the starting gate) like he (usually) does,” Baffert said of the Whitney. “He’s never really performed well on an off track.”

Baffert assured: “He’s bounced out of it well.”

Muth is running only his second race since the Arkansas Derby win in March that made him the nation’s leading 3-year-old, before an illness kept him out of the Preakness. After passing up a shot at the Pacific Classic for Muth, Baffert said he considered last week’s Pennsylvania Derby but opted to keep the colt at home.

“The whole thing is to have him ready for the Breeders’ Cup (Nov. 1-2 at Del Mar),” Baffert said. “He looks good. He always shows up. He’s a tough competitor.”

Santa Anita Handicap winner Newgate hasn’t raced since what Baffert called “a little setback” following his Dubai World Cup flop in March.

“He’s actually training very well, so I expect him to run well,” Baffert said. “I feel really good about all three of my horses. Now they have to get the trip.”

If Baffert’s horses ran 1-2-3, they’d bank $920,000.

“I just want to be able to run 1,” he said.

D’Amato has four of 11 horses in the John Henry Turf Championship, in two-time Del Mar Handicap winner Gold Phoenix (Kyle Frey riding), the 7-2 morning-line favorite, as well as 5-1 Balnikhov (Prat), 6-1 Divin Propos (Antonio Fresu) and 10-1 Rockemporor (Umberto Rispoli)

The trainer expects better from Gold Phoenix than he showed in running fifth in this race a year ago.

“I think we have a better line on him and how he needs to be ridden for success. Kyle Frey’s done a good job with him,” D’Amato said of  the 6-year-old, who blossomed this winter when Frey took the reins and began putting him in contention earlier in his races.

D’Amato mentioned Balnikhov next. As winner of the Dinner Party Stakes at Pimilico in May, the 5-year-old is eligible for a $2.5 million bonus from 1/ST if he wins the John Henry and a designated race at Gulfstream in 2025. He finished an excruciatingly close third to Gold Phoenix and Dicey Mo Chara at Del Mar, trying to rally off a slow pace.

“He doesn’t have the greatest post (for the John Henry), 11 of 11, but if anybody’s going to be able to give him a really good trip, I’m sure it’s Flavien,” D’Amato said.

In the City of Hope, D’Amato’s three must deal with Tim Yakteen-trained Johannes, the 4-5 favorite. D’Amato looks for 6-year-old Easter (Fresu), at 10-1, to regain his good winter form and make a late run, and looks for continued improvement from 4-year-olds Conclude (Hector Berrios), at 8-1, and Almendares (Prat), at 10-1.

“Almendares ran a really game second to Conclude (in the Del Mar Mile),” D’Amato said. “I think one or two more jumps and he actually wins the race. He’s a horse that’s definitely on the improve.”

The 10-race California Crown card starts at 12:30 p.m., a half-hour earlier than other days at the Santa Anita fall meet that opened Friday.

Originally Published: September 27, 2024 at 3:31 p.m.