by Steve Schuelein and Jeff Lowe

Ahmed Zayat has removed his horses from training in Southern California, transferring them from the barn of Bob Baffert to Steve Asmussen, Bill Mott, and Dale Romans.

Baffert trained six horses for Zayat, including Grade 3 winner Massive Drama and promising three-year-olds J Be K and Maimonides. Massive Drama finished third in the San Vicente Stakes (G2) on Sunday at Santa Anita Park.

Baffert and Zayat’s racing manager, Sobhy Sonbol, said issues with the synthetic surfaces in place at Southern California three major tracks led to the decision.

“He got frustrated with the track [surface] situation,” Baffert said. Santa Anita has canceled 11 days of racing because of problems with its all-weather synthetic surface.

Baffert shipped Maimonides and J Be K to Saratoga Race Course for their debut victories last summer when he and Zayat were concerned with the consistency of Del Mar’s Polytrack surface between morning workouts and afternoon racing.

In that same period, Zayat also removed eventual Grade 3 winner Z Fortune from Neil Drysdale in California and transferred him to Asmussen.

J Be K and Maimonides have both been ready to race for several weeks, but they remained idle with the track issues and a lack of opportunities within their allowance conditions.

J Be K is entered in a six-furlong allowance race on Friday at Fair Grounds for Asmussen.

“We’re trying to develop these three-year-olds and the environment these horses were in was not suitable to doing that,” Sonbol said. “It doesn’t make sense. I was going to ship J Be K to run in an allowance race on [February 9 at Fair Grounds] but the race didn’t go. I can’t be shipping horses out of town every time I want to run.”

Maimonides finished third in the Hopeful Stakes (G1) at Saratoga Race Course in his most recent start. He is a half brother to Baffert’s Grade 1 winners El Corredor and Roman Ruler. Baffert also trained Maimonides’s sire, Vindication. Mott will now oversee the $4.6-million yearling purchase.

Massive Drama will go to Romans and probably stretch out in his next start, Sonbol said.

Baffert also trained E Z Warrior, a Grade 3-winning four-year-old whom Zayat will send to Mott. 

Steve Schuelein is a Southern California-based Thoroughbred Times correspondent

Jeff Lowe is a Thoroughbred Times staff writer