Code of Honor will try to complete Travers-Whitney double

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Shug McGaughey still gets excited thinking about Code of Honor’s victory in last year’s Travers Stakes.

McGaughey hopes to enjoy that same feeling Saturday when Code of Honor returns to Saratoga in the Grade 1, $750,000 Whitney Stakes. On Monday, Code of Honor completed preparations for the Whitney by working a half-mile in 49.13 seconds over the Oklahoma training track. Under exercise rider Lexi Peaden, Code of Honor went his first quarter in 25.50, his second quarter in 23.63, and galloped out five furlongs in 1:01.78 and six furlongs in 1:15.17.

“If he hadn’t had breezed good today I wouldn’t have run him,” McGaughey said afterward. “But I thought he breezed really well. Going a mile and an eighth over this track is going to help him.”

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Code of Honor has run twice this year, winning the Grade 3 Westchester by a neck over Endorsed on June 6 and then finishing third, beaten 1 1/2 lengths by Vekoma, in the Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap on July 4.

“I thought he ran good in there,” McGaughey said of the Met Mile. “It was a speed-favoring track, Vekoma ran a great race. He was in front the whole way, we had to come around, and they ran extremely fast. We just weren’t able to get there. Maybe with a little bit better trip maybe we could have got there. I don’t know.”

Code of Honor, a son of Noble Mission owned and bred by William S. Farish, will be attempting to become the first horse since Lemon Drop Kid (1999-2000) to win the Travers as a 3-year-old and the Whitney at 4. (McGaughey won both races with Easy Goer in 1989). Code of Honor won last year’s Travers by a dominant three lengths, rallying from ninth in a 12-horse field to win going away.

“I’m still excited about how he ran in there that day because that’s what I had pointed for since the [Kentucky] Derby, and to see him run the way he ran was really satisfying,” McGaughey said.

John Velazquez, who has won this race four times, will ride Code of Honor in the Whitney, which offers a fees-paid berth into the $7 million Breeders’ Cup Classic on Nov. 7 at Keeneland.

As of Monday, there were five confirmed runners for the Whitney and one possible starter. The other confirmed starters are Tom’s d’Etat (Joel Rosario to ride), Improbable (Irad Ortiz Jr.), By My Standards (Jose Ortiz), and Mr. Buff (Junior Alvarado). It’s All Relevant is possible.

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Owner Michael Imperio said Monday that if It’s All Relevant is the sixth entrant there is a 70 percent chance he would run. It’s All Relevant once ran for $8,000, but is coming off two big-figure allowance victories and, more significantly, is a speed horse who would keep Mr. Buff occupied on the front end.

One horse who won’t be entering the Whitney is Bodexpress, the star-crossed colt who most recently was scratched from the Monmouth Cup on July 18 after a cut on his head he incurred on the van ride to Monmouth began bleeding during the post parade. Bodexpress will instead point to the $85,000 Alydar Stakes on Aug. 9 here at the same 1 1/8-mile distance of the Whitney.

Gustavo Delgado Jr., the son of the trainer, said the Alydar “makes more sense, especially since it’s been four months since the last time he’s run.”

“The Whitney is going to be a tough race,” he said.

On Monday, Bodexpress worked five furlongs in 1:02.11 over Saratoga’s main track.