Deep Miss Liberty headlines turf stakes doubleheader
If the day holds together, it will be a busy afternoon on the lawn Saturday at Monmouth Park. The $100,000 Miss Liberty Stakes, for fillies and mares routing on the turf, is now joined on the 14-race program by the $100,000 Rainbow Heir Stakes for turf sprinters, originally carded as part of last Sunday’s program that was lost to weather.
As of Thursday, the Weather.com forecast for Saturday in Oceanport, N.J., called for a 58 percent chance of rain, with scattered thunderstorms.
Such is the depth of trainer Chad Brown’s filly and mare turf string that, while having entered three in the Grade 2 Ballston Spa on Saturday at Saratoga, he still has a pair for the Miss Liberty in Counterparty Risk and Miss Teheran.
Counterparty Risk, winner of the Grade 3 Endeavour at Tampa Bay in her first start of 2021, finished in a dead heat for third in the Grade 3 Eatontown on June 20 at Monmouth behind Vigilantes Way. She then was second in the Big Dreyfus Stakes last month at Pimlico to Tightly Twisted. Both of her recent vanquishers return in the Miss Liberty.
Miss Teheran, looking for her first stakes win in the United States, was a rallying allowance winner Aug. 1 at Saratoga. That followed narrow defeats in her two previous outings at Belmont. The Beyer Speed Figure of 94 that she earned in her Saratoga victory is the top last-out number in this field.
The consistent Vigilantes Way, who will ship down from Saratoga for Shug McGaughey and the Phipps Stable, looms as the biggest threat to the Brown pair. Winner of the Tropical Park Oaks in December at Gulfstream, she spent this spring running third in the Dahlia Stakes and second in the Grade 3 Gallorette at Pimlico before taking the Eatontown. Most recently, she was seventh in the Grade 1 Diana at Saratoga.
Vigilantes Way will be reunited with Monmouth Park leading rider Paco Lopez, who rode her in the Eatontown.
Two races earlier, the Rainbow Heir reunites The Connector, Cajun Casanova, and Fox Rox, who were second, third, and fourth, respectively, in the Wolf Hill Stakes sprinting this same 5 1/2 furlongs on the Monmouth turf on July 17.
The Connector, beaten just three-quarters of a length in the Wolf Hill after making the pace, bounced back to win an allowance race on Aug. 4 at Colonial Downs for trainer Mark Hoffman. Also sporting a recent win at Colonial is Grateful Bred, who won the Meadow Stable on July 19 for his second victory in as many starts this year.