Disco's Son healthy again

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Disco's Son has shown flashes of brilliance during an injury-plagued career that sees him entering his 5-year-old campaign with only 13 starts under his belt.

But Disco's Son is healthy at the moment, and trainer Phil Serpe is hoping he'll be able to produce more of those flashes beginning with Thursday's $52,000 allowance feature at Gulfstream Park.

Disco's Son earned a 101 Beyer Speed Figure winning his entry-level allowance condition at Belmont Park during the spring of his 3-year-old campaign, and topped that with a career-best 107 when posting a 5 1/4-length second-level allowance win here last winter.

"He was just a few ticks off the six-furlong track record when he won here last year, but then we sent him up to New York and he wound up with a situation in the hind suspensory below the hock," explained Serpe. "We finally got him back to the races again at Saratoga, and in his second start he broke sideways, bumped another horse, and wound up hitting his front ankle so hard with his other foot that we had to stop on him again. It was a relatively minor issue but time consuming."

Disco's Son has trained forwardly at Palm Meadows for his return, although Serpe was not pleased when Disco's Son drew the inside post for Thursday's six-furlong dash.

"Being stuck down in there is not my favorite place, and he's a big horse who might take a few strides to get out of the gate, although I expect he'll be on or close to the lead," Serpe said.

Joe Bravo will be reunited with Disco's Son for the first time since guiding the horse to his near-record-setting triumph one year earlier.

Disco's Son should receive his stiffest opposition from Roi Maudit, who returns to allowance company off a fourth-place finish in the Grade 3 Mr. Prospector Handicap here Jan.o5. The setback snapped a three-race win streak for Roi Maudit, who followed a pair of easy wins with a game nose decision in an overnight stakes at Aqueduct in his 3-year-old finale. Like Disco's Son, Roi Maudit also has a pair of triple-digit Beyer efforts on his resume.

Saint Daimon figures to improve making the third start of his form cycle for trainer Allen Jerkens. Saint Daimon, Grade 3 stakes-placed as a 3-year-old in 2006, was sidelined 14 months before returning to finish fourth in a pair of optional claiming races earlier in the meet with conditions similar to Thursday's feature.