Cox has leading pair for first stakes of Ellis meet
Even as he ships out for the summer, Brad Cox is cutting his Kentucky colleagues no slack.
Cox, the leading trainer at the recently ended Churchill Downs spring meet, is in the process of sending most of the top horses in his powerhouse stable to Saratoga for a meet that starts July 15. But he still left plenty behind at Ellis Park, where he started the 31-day meet by sending out two winners last Sunday, opening day at the western Kentucky track.
And now here’s Cox with the likely favorites in the first two stakes of the meet Sunday, when first post is 12:50 p.m. Central. With Jorgito Abrego as his on-site assistant, Cox will be represented first by Field Day in the inaugural Dade Park Dash (race 4, 2:14), then by Dominga in the Ellis Park Turf (race 8, 4:10).
Field Day, bred and owned by the Klein family of Louisville, is seeking his fifth win from nine starts in the $60,000 Dade Dash, a 5 1/2-furlong turf race that drew seven 3-year-olds. Brian Hernandez Jr. has the call on Field Day, who followed a gutsy victory in the first stakes of the Churchill meet, the April 24 William Walker, by winning a May 30 allowance in which he was a 3-10 favorite.
Unitedandresolute, regrouped by Tom Amoss after a difficult trip in the Walker, looks like the top threat to Field Day.
In the $75,000 Ellis Turf, Dominga looms the one to beat in a field of eight fillies and mares going 1 1/16 miles. A winner in 4 of 11 previous starts, Dominga comes off a sharp June 13 triumph over the Churchill turf and figures tough with something similar. Shaun Bridgmohan will be aboard from post 1.
Pass the Plate, turning back from a pair of turf-marathon stakes for trainer Paul McGee, is foremost among the opposition, along with Alnaseem, a English-bred mare who gave trainer Ed Vaughan his first winner on American soil with a May 30 allowance romp at Churchill.
This is the 17th running of the Ellis Turf, the finale of an eight-race card that ends the first full week of racing at a meet that runs through Sept. 4. After Sunday, Ellis goes dark before a new three-day week starts Friday.