Life Is Good Shows Speed, Heart in Whitney Triumph

[Wandering Eyes]

Life Is Good (Into Mischief) caught a flier right out of the gate, strutted his stuff up front for six furlongs and fought off a pair of stubborn challengers through the Saratoga stretch to capture Saturday's $1-million GI Whitney S., punch his ticket to the GI Longines Breeders' Cup Classic and stick his nose in front of a crowded Horse of the Year race. Backed to 85 cents on the dollar looking for his eighth win in 10 career outings, the 'TDN Rising Star' could not have broken any better from his outside post and was in front in the blink of an eye. Kicking clear in a handful of strides, he was chased fairly closely by Hot Rod Charlie (Oxbow) and Olympiad (Speightstown) through a modest :23.64 quarter before turning on the jets down the backstretch and opening up by about four lengths past a half in :46.84. Hot Rod Charlie inched closer as Olympiad was asked for his best on the latter half of the far turn, and what looked like it would be a runaway score for Life Is Good suddenly became a horse race with Hot Rod Charlie and Happy Saver (Super Saver) eyeballing the favorite on either side as heads pointed for home. Irad Ortiz, Jr., confident into the lane despite the creeping danger, quickly got to work on Life Is Good, who began to turn back the pair past mid-stretch. Shifting to the inside from a righty whip and into Happy Saver's path while not quite interfering a furlong from home, Life Is Good held safe from there for a 1 1/2-length victory despite the valiant efforts of Happy Saver and Hot Rod Charlie, with the former narrowly edging the latter for second. Olympiad was a one-paced fourth.

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