Cookie Dough puts in fast and eventful work for Ballerina
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – The connections of Cookie Dough were looking for a serious work here Friday from their graded stakes-winning filly in preparation for the Grade 1 Ballerina on Aug. 8. And the speedy South Florida invader did not disappoint, zipping five furlongs in 57.83 seconds over the main track immediately after the renovation break.
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The work, unfortunately, did not go quite according to plan, with Cookie Dough picking up some unexpected company after an H. James Bond trainee broke off almost directly in front of her at the three-eighths pole.
“I wanted to keep her behind the other horse, but they were going so slow after leaving the pole we had to come around them on the turn,” said Heather Smullen, assistant to Cookie Dough’s trainer, Juan Alvarado. Smullen was aboard Cookie Dough for the work. “And when my filly got the dirt in her face, she became a little rank and took off before I really wanted her to. She came back to the barn a little tired, but over this track, which is deeper than what she’d been training on at Gulfstream, she got a lot out of the work. She cooled out fine afterwards, and this should really help her.”
Cookie Dough, who placed in five graded stakes before winning the Grade 3 Royal Delta over a sloppy track last winter at Gulfstream, is owned by Alan Cohen’s Arindel farm, and his son Brian talked about the reasoning behind shortening her back to seven-eighths for the Ballerina.
“We really were pointing for the Princess Rooney, also at seven furlongs, down here, but that race is kind of up in the air right now, which is the main reason we sent her to Saratoga,” Brian Cohen said. “She’s been working well, we know she’s fast, and maybe we were stretching her out a little too far, although she kept some really good company in most of those races. She works like a sprinter, so going back to seven furlongs should help.”
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Unfortunately, Cookie Dough is liable to hook up again in the Ballerina with Serengeti Empress. The two engaged in torrid speed duels in each of their two previous meetings, the 2019 Acorn at Belmont Park and the Grade 1 Apple Blossom this past spring at Oaklawn Park.
“We were on the inside of her in the Apple Blossom,” Cohen said. “At least if we have to face her again, I hope we draw outside her this time.”