Champion filly Take Charge Brandi returns in Test
RACE REPLAY IS NOT AVAILABLE
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Two champions have run at Saratoga this summer, and both have finished second. A third champion, Demonstrative, is scheduled to run in Thursday’s A.P. Smithwick for steeplechase runners.
On Saturday, Take Charge Brandi, the Eclipse Award-winning 2-year-old filly from last year, returns from a six-month layoff in the Grade 1, $500,000 Test Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at seven furlongs. On Tuesday, just before sunrise, Take Charge Brandi completed her preparation for the race by blowing out three furlongs in 36.07 seconds over an Oklahoma training track that still had moisture in it from Monday night rain.
Take Charge Brandi went her opening furlong in 12.72 seconds. She went from the quarter pole to the wire in 23.35.
“It was good; that was all she needed. It should put her on tilt for the Test,” trainer D. Wayne Lukas said.
Take Charge Brandi has not run since winning the Martha Washington Stakes at Oaklawn on Jan. 31, the first race of her 3-year-old season after winning the three straight graded stakes, including the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies, to end her 2-year-old campaign. Shortly thereafter, she was diagnosed with a non-displaced stress fracture in her right knee. No surgery was required, just time, according to Lukas.
Take Charge Brandi has made her last six starts around two turns. She has not raced around one turn since finishing fifth, 13 3/4 lengths behind Cavorting, in the Grade 2 Adirondack Stakes a year ago. Cavorting will be one of the horses to beat in the Test.
“I don’t think seven-eighths is ideal for her. I think she’s better at two turns,” Lukas said of his filly. “She gets into that cruising speed, she’s a fighter. If these things are real quick, they’ll probably confuse her a little bit. But after that much of a layoff and where I’ve got her on the work tab and everything, I think it’s a good spot to try.”
Luis Saez will ride Take Charge Brandi in the Test. Others expected to run include Angela Renee, By the Moon, Irish Jasper, Kathballu, Pleasant Tales, Sarah Sis, and So You Say. Bar of Gold and Super Majesty are possible.