Brisset runners pointing to Shuvee, Curlin at Saratoga

HENDERSON, Ky. – Rudy Brisset didn’t bother applying for stalls at Saratoga this summer, even knowing he’d probably have a few horses to run.

“We’ll ship and run from here,” Brisset said this week by phone from his farm in Versailles, Ky. “It just worked out that way this year.”

Crystal Ball, winner of the $250,000 Lady Jacqueline on the June 26 Ohio Derby undercard at Thistledown, and Harvard, a June 11 allowance winner at Churchill against older horses, are among those intended for stakes at the Spa. Crystal Ball probably goes in the July 25 Shuvee and Harvard in the July 30 Curlin.

Crystal Ball was making her first start for Brisset after leaving the care of Bob Baffert, the embattled Hall of Famer. “She won her first stakes, and now we are hoping to win a graded stakes with her,” he said.

Brisset is particularly bullish on Harvard, saying “he just needs one step forward” to crash the upper echelon of 3-year-olds. “He’s under the radar and I don’t mind that. I think he could become a top horse.”

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Brisset won an allowance last Sunday at Ellis with Hozier, a former Baffert trainee scheduled to be sold Monday at Fasig-Tipton. The runner-up in the Rebel and Sir Barton this spring, the Pioneerof the Nile colt was running back in eight days after finishing far back in the Ohio Derby.