Diversify finds easier spot on Saturday card

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – It would not have surprised anybody if the connections of Diversify had opted to run him in Saturday’s $125,000 Jazil Stakes. After three dominant wins to begin his career, the 4-year-old New York-bred gelding certainly looks stakes-caliber.

But they opted to take incremental steps with Diversify, who is running Saturday at Aqueduct but in a first-level, open-company allowance race at a mile and 70 yards in the race immediately following the Jazil.

“I’m hoping to have him around for the meat of the year and to find out exactly how good he is – and we hope he’s very good,” trainer Rick Violette said. “The Jazil is a tougher race than the a-other-than. He’s coming off a real fast race. I guess we’re eligible to bounce, but it seems like the prudent way to bring him forward. If we’re fortunate to win, terrific, and then we’ll decide what to do from there.”

Violette has trained Diversify for all three of his starts. His first two were for a partnership headed by WinStar Farm, which sold him at the Keeneland November bloodstock auction. He was purchased for $210,000 by Ralph Evans and his daughter and returned to Violette.

On Dec. 14, Diversify won a second-level New York-bred allowance race by 12 3/4 lengths, earning a 100 Beyer Speed Figure.

Diversify has been in front at every call in all three of his races. On Saturday, Diversify breaks from post 9 in a 10-horse field, and with some speed to his inside, Violette believes Diversify will be “tracking, which is fine with me.”

Irad Ortiz Jr. picks up the mount because regular rider Jose Ortiz is at Oaklawn Park.