Belmont: Clement's pair hard to separate in Voodoo Dancer

ELMONT, N.Y. – Earlier this meet, trainer Todd Pletcher won the Tweedside Stakes, named for a Grade 1-winning mare he had trained.

Sunday, at Belmont Park, trainer Christophe Clement will try to pull off a similar feat when he sends out two contenders in the $90,000 Voodoo Dancer Stakes, named for a nine-time stakes winning mare Clement previously trained.

Clement will send out the uncoupled entry of Fontley and Wallis in the Voodoo Dancer, scheduled for one mile on the Widener Turf course. Separating the two is not easy.

Fontley, a 5-year-old daughter of Sadler’s Wells, came off an eight-month layoff to win a third-level allowance race at Belmont on May 28, rallying through an opening along the rail in the stretch. Among those Fontley defeated was stablemate Blue Maiden, who came back to win a seven-furlong overnight stakes on June 28.

“She ran a good race,” Clement said of Fontley. “Her form was okay, though it wasn’t the most consistent form.”

Last fall, Wallis won an overnight stakes at a mile at Aqueduct. In two starts this year, she finished eighth in the Grade 3 Marshua’s River at Gulfstream and sixth in the Grade 1 Just a Game at Belmont on June 9.

Jose Lezcano rode Fontley and Wallis in their last starts but ended up on Wallis for the Voodoo Dancer. Ramon Dominguez rides Fontley.

“I made the decision for [Lezcano],” Clement said. “It’s not like he liked one more than the other. But Wallis is also a nice filly. It was obviously very ambitious to run in a Grade 1 but she trained so well we tried. This is a much easier race on paper.”

Sylvestris also drops into this overnight stakes after running fifth in the Just a Game. Robert Barbara, her trainer, said Sylvestris came into heat a day or two before the race and had no interest in racing that day.

“She was miserable that day,” Barbara said. “She was bad in the paddock. Mike Smith had to jump off her. She didn’t want to load in the gate. Her attitude was really nasty.”

Barbara opted to run in the Just a Game following a seven-length victory in a first-level allowance at Belmont in her previous start.

“I’m hoping she runs back to that race,” said Barbara, who has Rajiv Maragh to ride from post 8.

La Cloche, second to Fontley in the aforementioned May 28 race, makes her second start of the year. She was bottled in behind a slow pace but did finish with good energy to get second by a nose over Blue Maiden.

Check Point, All Due Respect, Millennia, and Kiss in the Forest complete the field.