LOS ALAMITOS, CA— SEPTEMBER 14, 2014—Trainer Paul Jones has enjoyed some great trial nights over the years at Los Alamitos Race Course. He once qualified eight horses to the running of the 2004 Los Alamitos Winter Derby.

“I had eight horses and I lost the final to Be A Bono,” Jones said. “The previous year I had (seven qualifiers) to the Winter Derby and we finished 1-2 with Lock To Load and Dealadash.”

Jones had a similarly big night this Sunday at Los Alamitos, as the veteran trainer won five of the nine trials contested to the $375,000 PCQHRA Breeders Futurity while saddling six of the 10 qualifiers.

“It was like the old days,” Jones said with a smile. “It had been a long time since I had a trial night like this at Los Alamitos. I had a nice group of babies running in these trials and things worked out for a lot of them.”

Jones’ qualifiers were led by the fastest qualifier of the evening in Donald and Peggy Boyle’s homebred colt, BF Farm Boss, who dominated his trial to the tune of a 2 ¼ length victory. The son of Hawkinson and out of Shirleys Strawfly, BF Farm Boss covered the 350-yard trial distance in :17.417 – the fastest clocking of the night by over 21/100ths of a second. Bruce and Jill Thompson’s Run By You finished with the second fastest time of the night after winning the opening trial in a time of :17.634.

“(BF Farm Boss) should have been in the All American Futurity,” Jones said. “He won his All American trial, but he was facing a 14 mile per hour head win and his time was not fast enough to make it. I really feel that if he had been in the All American final that he would have had a very good chance of winning the race. He’s a full brother to Strawkins, who still holds the 440-yard track record at Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico. We won the Rainbow Derby and the Bank of America Challenge Championships with Strawkins. This is a good family of horses.”

a BF Farm Boss improved his record to four wins in six career starts.

“This horse reminds me a lot of Strawkins because they’re both big, strong, colts,” Jones added. “I really liked Strawkins a lot. He’s one of my favorite horses ever. It’s a lot of fun to have a horse that reminds so much of Strawkins.”

Jones also qualified Abigail Kawananakoa’s trial winners A Goddess Thru Fire and HRH Walkonfire, plus David Brownell’s Off Beat, Tony Doughtie’s Myoceanmemories, and La Presita LLC’s Captain Planet. When asked to name a horse that could improve the most between these trials and the final, Jones did not hesitate.

Both Kawanankoa horses and Captain Planet are by Walk Thru Fire and Myoceanmemory is by Separatist.

“I think that BF Farm Boss can improve the most,” he said. “He ran a little green in his trial and I think he can get better. Both of Abigail’s horses are very talented and Captain Planet also ran a very nice race.”

Jones saddled Doughtie’s Stel My Corona to victory in the 2012 Breeders Futurity and will now look to make it two with the owner with Myoceanmemories. La Presita LLC will look for a second major futurity win with Captain Planet. La Presita won the Los Alamitos Two Million Futurity with Foose Cash SR last year.

Trained by Juan Aleman, Run By You was only making her third career start, but she made the most of it. Bred in Kentucky, the Apollitical Jess filly was ridden by Carlos Huerta and has now her last two starts. Robert Gentry bred Run By You.

In a matchup of futurity winners, Jose Arturo Flores’ Kindergarten Futurity winner Old Girl came out on top over a field that included Kindergarten Futurity finalist Off Beat, who held on to finish second in this trial, and Governor’s Cup Futurity winner Discontent, who just missed qualifying to the final. Old Girl improved her record to four wins in five career starts. This was the Stel Corona filly’s first outing since being disqualified from fourth and placed sixth in a trial to the Governor’s Cup Futurity. She came into this race after an impressive 350-yard gate drill on August 19. Offbeat is by Foose.

“That workout gave me a lot of faith and confidence in Old Girl,” the owner said.

Old Girl covered the distance in the fourth fastest qualifying time of :17.650. She finished a ½ length ahead of the Jones-trained Off Beat, whose clocking of :17.739 earned him the ninth fastest qualifying time. Meanwhile, Old Girl has now won four of five career starts.

“Old Girl has a lot of power,” Flores said. “I’ve been around a long time in racing and I know that a horse can’t win them all. It’s impossible to win them all. I just hope Old Girl came back nicely from this race.”

For the complete list of qualifiers including times, sires, dams, owners, breeders, trainers and jockeys CLICK HERE.

Jockey Rodrigo Aceves was diagnosed with a fracture neck following a spill in the third race of the night. Aceves remains hospitalized at Los Alamitos Medial Center (See related story).

Courtesy of www.losalamitos.com.