$250,000 Smarty Jones Stakes, Jan. 1, 2023 (10 qualifying points for first, 4 for second, 3 for third, 2 for fourth, and 1 for fifth)  Winner: Victory Formation, by Tapwrit Trainer: Brad Cox Jockey: Flavien Prat Owner: Spendthrift Farm and Frank Fletcher Racing Operations Beyer: 91 Distance - time: 1 mile – 1:38.14 Win margin: 3 lengths :: Bet the races with a $200 First Deposit Match and FREE Formulator PPs! Join DRF Bets. Victory Formation was 3-5 favorite in the Smarty Jones in great part because he came into the race with two wins from two starts and had popular connections -- Flavien Prat riding for trainer Brad Cox -- but the nature of the competition also had something to do with his price. Namely, there was none. Victory Formation, from the first crop to race by the young stallion Tapwrit, easily won his career debut, a Keeneland sprint, over suspect competition, and was a game Nov. 26 winner of a Churchill first-level allowance, where he dueled on a hot pace and held on doggedly, third-place Lugan Knight returning to win the Jerome Stakes on Jan. 7 at Aqueduct.   Luis Saez rode Victory Formation in his first two starts but Flavien Prat came to ride him in the Smarty Jones – and Prat rode him like a 3-5 favorite. Breaking well enough from an outside draw, Victory Formation was three wide contesting the pace into the first turn, but Prat had designs on the engine and pushed his way over to the rail and onto the lead midway round the bend. Victory Formation went 23.20 for his first quarter, then 24.75 for the second. He ran quarter-mile that included the second turn vigorously, going 24.61, switched leads professionally enough, opened a wide advantage under moderate urging, shied from the marks left on the track by the starting gate, and won easily. Victory Formation handled the stretch-out with no issue and is an appealing-looking colt with scope and speed. The quibbles: He dominated inferior competition with a pace advantage, and while his stride is long, his action is less than efficient and includes modest paddling with his left-front leg. Greater challenges await.  Cox trainees ran one-two with Angel of Empire second, three lengths behind the winner and three lengths in front of Denington, who was third by a half-length in front of Western Ghent. A two-time route winner at Horseshoe Indianapolis, Angel of Empire broke from post 7 and lacked early speed, and just as he was about to be caught some six paths wide into the first turn, his rider snugged him back and over to the fence to save ground around the clubhouse bend. Angel of Empire had inside passage down the backstretch and around the far turn, picking off horses one by one until only Victory Formation was in front of him at the three-sixteenths pole. He could make no late headway on his winning stablemate but finished decently. It looked like Cox had instructed jockey Joe Talamo to give the colt a serious gallop-out, Talamo twice throwing the reins at Angel of Empire as he caught and ran well clear of Victory Formation going around the clubhouse turn before being pulled up. This looked like practice for a longer contest.  Denington broke from post 6, and as Angel of Empire went to the fence into the first turn, he was caught four to five paths wide all the way around it -- costly ground loss. Denington was only about two paths off the fence while making mild progress around the second turn, leveling off decently in the homestretch to run down tiring pace-chaser Western Ghent for third. Granted, Denington ran a lot farther than second-place Angel of Empire, but he hardly lit the world on fire here and threw more cold water on the Nov. 26 Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes, where he’d finished fifth, beaten just 1 1/2 lengths.   Western Ghent came into the race with a top Beyer of 56 and went off a 56-1 shot, outrunning his odds while making one wonder just how soft this race was, top to bottom, if he could finish a half-length out of third. Tapped for speed out of the gate, Western Ghent steadied moderately around the clubhouse turn when Victory Formation crossed over to the rail. From there, he chased the winner, hung in until upper stretch, and was nabbed late for third.   Probably meaningless, but fifth place How Did He Do That turned in a mildly interesting performance. Mid-pack around the first turn, he sucked back out of contention down the backstretch and was off the bridle into the far turn, fading to last, before finding renewed zeal past the three-furlong marker and coming home decently.  As the 4-1 second choice, Ten Days Later rated as the race’s disappointment finishing a distant sixth. Last after a few strides, he raced from the rear of the field, made a modest move under heavy urging from the half-mile pole to the quarter pole, passing How Did He Do That early on the far turn, but flattened out and played no real part.   Communication Memo, supplemented into this race after a sharp Oaklawn maiden win, took a tiny hop out of the gate and didn’t supply the early pace his jockey asked for, racing mid-pack and between horses down the backstretch. He made a minor far-turn move three paths wide but came up empty in the homestretch.  C. J’s Storm at 70-1 didn’t belong in the race on paper, nor could he contend in the running. Somewhat green around the first turn, he managed to hold his own past the three-furlong pole before being outrun, his rider wisely wrapping up on the gelding through the final furlong.  :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.