Brown has the runners to beat in Sheepshead Bay, Fort Marcy
Though he’ll have plenty to keep him occupied at Churchill Downs on Saturday – most notably starting favorite Zandon in the 148th Kentucky Derby – trainer Chad Brown will be checking in periodically on the proceedings at Belmont Park, where he has contenders in the Fort Marcy and Sheepshead Bay – both Grade 2, $200,000 turf stakes – as well as Sound Money in the Grade 2, $200,000 Westchester Stakes.
Brown has dominated those two turf stakes in recent years, winning the Fort Marcy the last four years and four of the last six runnings of the Sheepshead Bay.
Saturday, Brown’s Virginia Joy looks very much the horse to beat in the 1 3/8-mile Sheepshead Bay, which, with only five runners, has been carded as the third of 11 races on a card that begins at 12:20 p.m.
Virginia Joy, a Group 3 winner in Germany in 2020, is coming off a strong effort winning the Grade 3 The Very One Stakes on March 5 at Gulfstream Park off an eight-month layoff. Family Way, second in the The Very One, came back to win the Grade 3 Orchid and then finished second to heavily favored War Like Goddess last week in the Grade 3 Bewitch.
Brown hopes the last race was a foreshadowing of what may lay ahead in 2022 for Virginia Joy.
“I was super impressed with that performance off a layoff,” Brown said. “She had been touting herself in the morning at Payson where we train her and had a terrific winter. I thought she really benefited from her break as much as any horse I gave time off to this winter. She filled out and really matured. She’s a horse I had trouble keeping weight on last year and keeping any consistent form.”
Trevor McCarthy rides Virginia Joy from post 5.
Last year, trainer Arnaud Delacour won the Sheepshead Bay with Magic Attitude. Saturday, he’ll send out Luck Money, who in 2020 won the Zagora Stakes at Belmont. She is 0 for 7 since but has finished second in a trio of graded stakes. She makes her first start since running fourth in the Grade 3 Long Island on Nov. 27 at Aqueduct.
Trainer Graham Motion, who won the 2012 Sheepshead Bay with Aruna, ships in both Sister Otoole and Mia Martina. Sister Otoole won a first-level allowance gong 1 1/4 miles last summer at Belmont, but is winless in six starts since. She is coming off a troubled-trip fourth in the Orchid on April 2 at Gulfstream.
“Belmont is more her style,” Motion said.
Lovely Lucky, winless in seven stakes tries, completes the field.
Brown has three for Fort Marcy
Rockemperor, winner of the Grade 1 Joe Hirsch Turf Classic last fall, heads a three-horse uncoupled entry for Brown in the Fort Marcy, scheduled for 1 1/8 miles over the inner turf.
Following that Hirsch, Rockemperor finished eighth in the Breeders’ Cup Turf and then stayed in California, where he ran back in 20 days and finished fifth as the 4-5 favorite in the Grade 2 Hollywood Turf Cup.
“The horse is more used to being trained at home and not away from his home base, so I’m going to draw a line through that race even though he didn’t run terrible,” Brown said. “He’s a horse that runs really good fresh, so he seems lined up to put a good effort in right off the bat.”
Dylan Davis, who entered the race week six wins shy of 1,000 for his career, has the call on Rockemperor from post 6.
Sacred Life won the Grade 3 Knickerbocker going 1 1/8 miles at Belmont last October. He then was beaten a head by Field Pass in the Grade 2 Seabiscuit at Del Mar.
In two starts this year, Sacred Life finished sixth in the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Turf and fourth in the Grade 2 Mervin Muniz at Fair Grounds, both races in which Brown felt the horse was too far back. Brown is equipping the 7-year-old Sacred Life with blinkers for the first time Saturday.
“I don’t normally make any changes with older horses like him, but I am going to put some blinkers on him,” Brown said. “I’m hoping that gives a better early position.”
L’Imperator, a 5-year-old gelding by Holy Roman Emperor, is 0 for 5 in U.S. stakes, but Brown believes he has been trip-compromised in several of those races.
“We’ll give him the benefit of the doubt based on the trips he’s had. I do think there’s a racehorse in there,” Brown said.
City Man, trained by Christophe Clement, came off a four-month layoff to win the Danger’s Hour Stakes going a mile at Aqueduct last month. He finished second to the Brown-trained Tribhuvan in last year’s Fort Marcy, earning a career-best 100 Beyer Speed Figure in the process.
Doswell, who won the Grade 2 Fort Lauderdale at Gulfstream in December for Barclay Tagg, and King Cause, winner of the Kentucky Cup Classic over Turfway’s synthetic surface, look like the speed of the race. King Cause goes out for trainer Mike Maker, who also sends out Glynn County.
Longshot Starting Over completes the field.