Cigar Mile at Aqueduct pushed back a week

The Grade 1 Cigar Mile will be run on Dec. 7, a week later than usual, and be part of the Aqueduct winter meet, according to a schedule released Wednesday by the New York Racing Association.

Typically run on the Saturday of Thanksgiving weekend, the Cigar Mile has been pushed back in recent years to be run four weeks after the Breeders’ Cup, in early December. However, this year it will be conducted five weeks after the Breeders’ Cup, perhaps making it more enticing for a runner from Breeders’ Cup card to run back.

The Cigar Mile tops a four-stakes card that includes the Remsen and Demoiselle – both Grade 2 stakes worth $250,000 for 2-year-olds and 2-year-old fillies, respectively – and the Grade 3, $250,000 Go for Wand Handicap for fillies and mares at one mile.

The Aqueduct fall meet, which runs from Nov. 1 through Dec. 1, will include 22 stakes - seven of which are Grade 3 events - worth $3.4 million in purses. The richest stakes of the fall meet is the Grade 3, $400,000 Long Island, a 1 3/8-mile turf stakes for females on Nov. 30. That day’s card also includes the Grade 3, $200,000 Discovery for 3-year-olds and the $125,000 Aqueduct Turf Sprint Championship.

The Grade 3, $200,000 Fall Highweight tops a three-stakes Thanksgiving Day card on Nov. 28, while the Grade 3, $150,000 Comely Stakes for 3-year-old fillies tops the Nov. 29 card.

Other graded events offered at the fall meet are the Grade 3, Turnback the Alarm Handicap for fillies and mares on Nov. 2 and the Grade 3, $150,000 Nashua Stakes for 2-year-olds on Nov. 3. The $150,000 Tempted, for 3-year-old fillies, lost its graded status and will be run on the Nov. 1 opening-day card.

During the Aqueduct winter meet, which officially begins Dec. 5, there will be two seven-furlong New York Stallion Stakes races - one for juveniles and one for juvenile fillies - each worth $500,000. The Great White Way, for 2-year-old males, will be run on Dec. 14, while the Fifth Avenue, for fillies, will be run Dec. 15.