Cookie Dough transferred from Gold to McLaughlin following Black-Eyed Susan third

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Cookie Dough is coming off arguably the best performance of her career, a third-place finish in the prestigious Black-Eyed Susan last Friday at Pimlico. But she will not be coming back to trainer Stanley Gold’s barn at Gulfstream Park.

Instead, Cookie Dough, who set the pace to midstretch before tiring to finish 2 3/4 lengths behind Point of Honor in the Grade 2 Black-Eyed Susan, has been sent to trainer Kiaran McLaughlin at Belmont Park to be pointed to the one-mile, Grade 1 Acorn at Belmont on June 8.

“This is no slight on Stanley at all,” said Brian Cohen, president of Arindel Farm and the son of owner Alan Cohen. “This is more about where we want to go with her next rather than taking her from Stanley.

“We’ve wanted to try her in a Grade 1 all along. She didn’t get into the [Kentucky] Oaks, and we thought a one-turn mile like the Acorn would be perfect for her. The logistics of sending her straight to New York [from Pimlico] rather than back to Florida and then shipping her up north again just made more sense.”

Cohen said that after the Acorn all decisions regarding Cookie Dough will be made on a race-by-race basis. Arindel, which has more than 40 2-year-olds in training split between the farm in Ocala, Fla., and the racetrack, still has approximately 20 horses in Gold’s care at Gulfstream Park.

“All the big races for 3-year-old fillies are up here, although this is not to say she might not return with Stanley in the future,” said Cohen. “He’s still our main guy.”

Cookie Dough, a homebred daughter of Brethren, ran eight times for Gold and continued to improve with experience from the middle of her 2-year-old campaign. She won the final two legs of the filly division of the Florida Sire Stakes series by a combined 14 lengths to close out her juvenile season in 2018. She opened her 3-year-old campaign by finishing second, beaten a head, in the one-mile Davona Dale and third, 1 1/4 lengths behind Champagne Anyone and nearly a length in front of Point of Honor, four weeks later in the 1 1/16-mile Gulfstream Park Oaks.

She was not entered in the Kentucky Oaks when it was apparent she would have been the first also-eligible due to a lack of qualifying points to get into the field.

“That’s just the business,” Gold said Monday. “I can understand their thinking, but it’s always disappointing to lose a good horse. I was so proud of her the other day. I thought she ran excellent. She really gave it all she had, especially considering a mile and one-eighth might not be her best distance. The winner missed the track record by only three-fifths of a second and she had to carry high weight of 124 pound and concede the top two finishers four pounds apiece. These things are always a little hard to take, but I wish everybody nothing but good luck with her down the road.”

Gold is familiar with the harsh realities of the business. The veteran horseman lost his Calder-based Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Filly champion Awesome Feather in 2010 when she was sold by owner Fred Brei for $2.3 million at the Fasig-Tipton November sale to Adena Springs 48 hours after wrapping up a perfect 2-year-old campaign for Gold with an easy 2 1/4-length victory in BC Juvenile Fillies at Churchill Downs.