Arklow one good work away from coming for Del Mar Handicap
Arklow will start in the $300,000 Del Mar Handicap on Aug. 21 provided he works well at Saratoga on Friday, trainer Brad Cox said Wednesday.
If he runs, the start will be the third for Arklow in California and would prepare the millionaire 7-year-old for another trip to the West Coast for the Breeders’ Cup Turf on Nov. 6 at Del Mar.
“It will be a maintenance work, and we’ll check him the day after,” Cox said. “We’ll do a little more homework on the race.”
Arklow is one of the leading candidates for the Grade 2 Del Mar Handicap, a 1 3/8-mile turf race, along with United, winner of the Grade 2 Eddie Read Stakes at 1 1/8 miles on July 24.
The winner of the Del Mar Handicap receives a fees-paid berth to the BC Turf.
Arklow was eighth in the 2019 BC Turf at Santa Anita and won the Grade 2 Hollywood Turf Cup at 1 3/8 miles at Del Mar last November in his most recent trip to the West Coast. On July 17, Arklow clipped heels on the turn and finished sixth in the Grade 1 United Nations Stakes at Monmouth Park.
“He didn’t get to run his race,” Cox said. “He clipped heels at the three-eighths. He caught himself, but the opportunity to win the race was over.”
Florent Geroux is booked to ride Arklow and also will be aboard Hit the Road in the Grade 2 Del Mar Mile on turf on Aug. 21.
Hit the Road, trained by Dan Blacker, has not raced since a fifth-place finish in the Grade 1 Maker’s Mark Mile at Keeneland in April. Hit the Road, who won the Grade 1 Frank Kilroe Mile at Santa Anita in March, was briefly sidelined with a muscle strain in the spring.
“Everything is going to plan,” Blacker said Wednesday. “He’s been training really well.”
The $300,000 Del Mar Mile is on the schedule of Smooth Like Strait, winner of the Grade 1 Shoemaker Mile on May 31 at Santa Anita, trainer Michael McCarthy said.
The Grade 1 Pacific Classic at 1 1/4 miles on dirt is the main race on the Aug. 21 program. The field is likely to include Tizamagician, winner of the Grade 3 Cougar II Stakes at 1 1/2 miles on July 18.
Trainer Richard Mandella said last weekend that Tizamagician was a candidate for the Greenwood Cup on Sept. 25 at Parx Racing, but on Wednesday said the horse is more likely to run in the $1 million Pacific Classic. Flavien Prat, who rode Tizamagician in the Cougar II Stakes, will have the mount in the Pacific Classic.
Mandella has one of the top contenders for the Pacific Classic in Royal Ship, winner of the Grade 2 Californian Stakes at Santa Anita in April.