HOLLYWOOD PARK : Injured Toussaud Runs Gamely to Victory

Neither the winner nor the beaten favorite had an easy time during the $165,200 Gamely Handicap at Hollywood Park on Sunday.

The difference was, Toussaud scored a one-length victory, and Exchange, at 17-10, got nothing for finishing last in a nine-horse field.

Toussaud suffered a cut on her left foreleg at the top of the stretch, when she was in fifth place and her jockey, Kent Desormeaux, was looking for racing room. Exchange, running her poorest race since an eighth-place finish in last October’s Breeders’ Cup Distaff, reared at the start of the 1 1/8-mile grass race and lost a shoe.

Toussaud, a difficult horse for Bobby Frankel to train since the 4-year-old El Gran Senor-Image Of Reality filly arrived in his barn from Europe late last year, won in 1:45, breaking the stakes record by four-fifths of a second and missing Tight Spot’s two-year-old track record by a fifth of a second.

“She cut the inside of her leg pretty bad,” said Frankel, who has won the Gamely in three of the last four years. “It might not be too serious. Kent wanted to keep her inside, because the first time he swung her out (in a third-place finish at Santa Anita), she bolted to the outside. Today, he kept her in tight quarters to keep her interested.”

Coupled with Revasser, Prince Khalid Abdullah’s other Frankel-trained starter, Toussaud paid $5.80 as the second choice, earning $97,700. Gold Fleece, who was 17-1, ran second, a length better than Bel’s Starlet, who led until the final sixteenth of a mile. Revasser finished fourth.

Exchange went into the Gamely with a grass record of seven victories, one second and one third in 10 starts. “Laffit (Pincay) said she jumped in the air at the start,” trainer Bill Spawr said. “This track’s too hard for her, and the bad start hurt a lot. If you’re not close on this turf course, you’ve got no shot.”

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Frankel could be on his way to a big weekend. He will have $500,000 races a continent apart today, running Val Des Bois and Rainbow Corner in the Hollywood Turf Handicap and making a comeback with Bertrando in the Metropolitan Handicap at Belmont Park.

Not even trainer Charlie Whittingham, winner of the Turf Handicap a record seven times, has ever won the Hollywood Turf Handicap three consecutive years. Frankel can do that today by using a tactic that Whittingham calls “surrounding the opposition.”

Although Val Des Bois is the 5-2 favorite on his morning line, the 7-year-old French-bred’s ability to win at 1 1/4 miles can be questioned. Val Des Bois will carry 120 pounds, and Rainbow Corner, an English-bred 4-year-old colt, is one of the light weights at 114 pounds. Frankel’s first of four victories in the Turf Handicap came in 1973, when Life Cycle carried only 115 pounds, 15 less than heavily favored Cougar II.

Frankel won his second Turf Handicap with Johnny’s Image in 1979, and has won the last two years with Exbourne and Quest For Fame.

Rainbow Corner, 4-1 on the morning line, won only two of nine starts in Europe before joining Frankel in California. His two local starts resulted in a victory in an allowance race at Santa Anita in April and a driving second, a head behind Leger Cat, in the John Henry Handicap at Hollywood Park on May 9.

Lomitas, the German import who has a record of 10 victories and three seconds and earnings of almost $1 million despite a history of sore hoofs, is rated behind Val Des Bois at 3-1.