Aqueduct: Sweet Reason to make 2014 debut Friday

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Sweet Reason, last year’s Grade 1 Spinaway Stakes winner, will make her 3-year-old debut in a one-mile allowance race Friday at Aqueduct.

The $69,000 race, which is for 3-year-old fillies who have never won three races lifetime or who are entered for a claiming price of $75,000, drew a field of five. The other four runners are maiden winners still eligible for a first-level allowance condition.

Sweet Reason, trained by Leah Gyarmati, has not started since finishing fourth as the favorite in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies at Santa Anita in November. Prior to that, Sweet Reason had won two starts at Saratoga, including the Spinaway by 5 3/4 lengths, and finished second to Artemis Agrotera in the Grade 1 Frizette at Belmont.

Gyarmati is hoping to use this allowance race as a steppingstone toward the Grade 2, $300,000 Gazelle on April 5 and then perhaps the Kentucky Oaks on May 2.

“It’s a good spot to start with; it’s going to be a little easier than some of the other spots that I would have had to choose from,” said Gyarmati, who was considering running Sweet Reason in the $100,000 Caesar’s Wish at Laurel Park this Saturday.

On Sunday, Sweet Reason worked five furlongs in 1:00.54 over the Belmont training track, getting her final quarter in 23.58 seconds under Irad Ortiz Jr., who will ride Sweet Reason for the first time Friday. Alex Solis rode Sweet Reason in all four of her starts last year.

Sweet Reason began her breeze two to three lengths behind Privatize and finished two or three lengths ahead of that rival while galloping out six furlongs in 1:14.07. It was the ninth breeze for Sweet Reason since January.

“I was torn between doing something long, but then she’s not going to have a real sharp breeze,” Gyarmati said. “She hadn’t done anything fast, so hopefully that’ll have her good to go.”

Sweet Reason will break from post 3.

Also entered in Friday’s race are Ballylee, who won her debut Dec. 22 but finished fifth as the favorite in the Busher Stakes on Feb. 1, Wraith, Aqua Regia, and Brown Mellisa.