Coup de Grace puts in final work for King’s Bishop
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Larry Jones will send Coup de Grace back to Saratoga, hoping the horse can repeat his winning performance in the Grade 2 Amsterdam earlier this summer in Saturday’s Grade 1 King’s Bishop. But as was the case the last time, Jones himself will not make the trip.
“Right now, I don’t think I’m going to make it,” said Jones. “I’m pretty good getting through training hours, but I just can’t do the whole day. I can’t do the doubleheader. If I try, it would knock me out for the next three days. For now, I’m still just taking little baby steps.”
Jones is recuperating from injuries sustained in a training mishap at Delaware Park on April 19.
Coup de Grace had his final tune-up for the seven-furlong King’s Bishop on Monday at Delaware, where he worked a bullet five furlongs in 59.40 seconds.
“He worked great. He went fast, but that’s kind of an easy work for him, and all systems are go for the King’s Bishop,” said Jones. “Seven furlongs should be ideal for him, there looks like a lot of speed in the field, and we’re really looking forward to getting him back up there to run again.”
A field of eight is shaping up for the King’s Bishop when it is drawn Wednesday. Coup de Grace is likely to be favored over a group that includes the steadily improving The Big Beast, Amsterdam runner-up C. Zee, the undefeated Fast Anna, the multiple graded stakes winner Wildcat Red, Myositis Dan, Noble Cornerstone, and Noble Moon.
Noble Moon also worked Monday, breezing an easy three-eighths at Saratoga in 36.82 seconds for trainer Leah Gyarmati. The King’s Bishop will be the first time the injury-plagued Noble Moon has run since finishing sixth in the Grade 1 Wood Memorial on April 5. Noble Moon was also nominated for the Travers.
“Barring anymore problems, he’s still on schedule to run in the King’s Bishop,” said Gyarmati. “I just sent him out there today to remind him he’ll need to be running in the stretch since it looks like there is plenty of speed in this field, and I hope he’ll be running at the end. He really wants to go long, he’s bred to go long, he trains like a horse who wants to go long, but he’s not ready to go a mile and one-quarter just yet, and the King’s Bishop is about the only other option we have right now.”
Gyarmati also sent out Sweet Reason to breeze three furlongs in 35.53 seconds Monday at Saratoga in her first work since winning the Grade 1 Test. She’ll make her next start in Parx’s Cotillion Stakes on Sept. 20.
“She wasn’t supposed to go that fast; she was supposed to go an easy three-eighths,” said Gyarmati. “As a 2-year-old, she never worked like that, but all of a sudden as a 3-year-old, she likes to work the bullet.”