Belmont: Brown hopes November is like October

Adam Coglianese/NYRA

Kid Kate, with Jose Lezcano riding, wins the Classy Mirage Stakes.

ELMONT, N.Y. - October is only half over, and it’s already been quite good to trainer Chad Brown.

Brown has won 7 of 28 starts in October with five of those wins being stakes. And while winning Sunday’s $80,000 Classy Mirage Stakes with Kid Kate may not be like winning Saturday’s Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland with Dayatthespa, it was rewarding nonetheless.

Kid Kate, a 5-year-old daughter of Lemon Drop Kid, has won stakes every year since she was 2.

“It might not have been one of the headline wins we had this week, but it was a rewarding win,” Brown said Monday at Belmont. “For that filly to win a stakes at 5, having won a stakes every year since age 2, she’s been a rock-solid horse for our stable. She’s been a money-earner for us every year, and when you’re running a business as a trainer you love to have those solid horses that are very reliable like her.”

Brown said Kid Kate would likely be retired at year’s end, but he was not sure if she would run again.

At Belmont, Brown has won with 5 of his last 13 starters and now has moved into a second-place tie in the standings with Richard Dutrow Jr. Both have 13 wins, three behind David Jacobson with two weeks remaining in the meet.

While Brown said he is not focusing on trying to win the trainer’s title, he said, “I still have some horses left to run that I really like.”

Brown is preparing to run as many as seven horses to Santa Anita for this year’s Breeders’ Cup, led by the undefeated Awesome Feather, who on Sunday worked five furlongs in 1:02.97 over the main track.

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Zagora, Brown’s candidate for the Filly and Mare Turf, worked a half-mile on the turf in 51.75 seconds in company with Flashy Gal, whom Brown is hoping to get into the Juvenile Fillies Turf.