Birdstone Stakes a rare wide-open affair with six strong entrants
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SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Wednesday’s renewal of the $150,000 Birdstone Stakes at Saratoga figures to be more competitive than the previous two years when Next dominated his competition at odds of 3-5 in 2023 and 1-20 in 2024.
This field of six lacks a standout with four horses pegged between 7-5 and 9-2 on the morning line.
Parchment Party figures to go favored coming off his 8 1/2-length victory in the Grade 3 Belmont Gold Cup, a race originally scheduled for two miles on turf but one that was run at 1 3/4 miles – the distance of the Birdstone – over a sloppy track here June 6.
That victory was Parchment Party’s first since he began his career with two wins around two turns at Churchill Downs in the fall of his 2-year-old year.
“He looked like a Derby horse,” trainer Bill Mott said.
But an injury sidelined Parchment Party until October of his 3-year-old season and when he came back to the races “he seemed not to be as fast as we thought he was,” Mott said.
Parchment Party showed some signs of life in the spring with a couple of placings in nine-furlong allowance races in Kentucky before his breakthrough score in the Gold Cup.
The question handicappers will have to grapple with is how much Parchment Party’s win was aided by a sloppy track that he relished but no one else did.
The alternatives to Parchment Party includes Lambeth, Game Warden, and Digital Ops.
Lambeth, a 4-year-old son of Arrogate, won the Temperence Hill Stakes going 1 1/2 miles over a wet Oaklawn Park track in March. He came back one month later and finished fourth as the favorite in the Isaac Murphy Marathon at Churchill.
“It was back in four weeks and it was a little too close, I think,” trainer Joe Sharp said. “He runs so hard over such a long distance that he just needs a little bit more time in between races to get himself back up.”
With an eye toward Kentucky Downs in the fall, Sharp ran Lambeth in the Chorleywood Stakes at Churchill going 1 1/2 miles on turf where he set the pace and was taken on by Goldeneye earlier than anticipated before fading to fourth behind the late-running Rebel Red.
“It was a good race,” said Sharp, noting that Julien Leparoux on Goldeneye “made an early move and took us on at the three-eighths pole. [Brian Hernandez Jr.] thought maybe he could have won it if he was left alone a little longer.”
The Chorleywood proved a productive race, with Highway Robber coming back to win the Kentucky Downs Preview Turf Cup on Sunday, fifth-place finisher Goldeneye winning two allowance races including one here Aug. 1, and last-place finisher Tapit Shoes taking a July 13 allowance at Ellis Park.
“He’s had some great works up here. He’s training phenomenal. He’s an honest horse,” Sharp said. “These distance specialists seem to be in a league of their own when they get good at it. I feel really confident in how well he’s doing.”
Jose Ortiz, aboard for a Feb. 23 allowance win, will be aboard Lambeth for the first time since then.
Game Warden finished second to Lambeth in the Temperence Hill before finishing third in the Murphy on April 30. Game Warden, who has not been out since the Murphy, won a pair of allowance races going nine furlongs at Saratoga last summer.
Ricardo Santana Jr., aboard for those allowance wins and the third-leading rider at this meet with 19 wins, is back aboard Game Warden on Wednesday.
Digital Ops, trained by Saffie Joseph Jr., is coming off a second-place finish behind Malarchuk in a July 12 allowance race here for which he earned a 100 Beyer Speed Figure.
Time for Trouble, third behind Lambeth and Game Warden in the Temperence Hill, and Strapped, who has won two 1 1/4-mile allowance races this year for Rudy Rodriguez, complete the field.
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