'Dixie Dot' a millionaire if he wins

GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas - Dixie Dot Com can become a millionaire on Lone Star Million Day with a win in the Grade 3 $300,000 Lone Star Park Handicap, one of seven stakes worth a cumulative $1 million Monday at Lone Star Park.

The program, which is the richest day of racing in Texas, also features Hallowed Dreams, who will make her first start outside of Louisiana in the $100,000 Valid Expectations Stakes.

Dixie Dot Com will be an odds-on favorite in the Lone Star Park Handicap, a 1 1/16-mile race, because his chief rival, Mr Ross, did not enter Saturday.

"We just didn't feel he was 100 percent when we evaluated him this morning, and you need to be 100 percent to be in these kinds of races," said Mr Ross's trainer, Donnie Von Hemel. Instead, Von Helem will run Custer in the Lone Star Handicap.

The field is completed by Remington Rock, Fan the Flame, Desert Demon, Rebridled, Five Straight, and Big Numbers.

Dixie Dot Com was a 6 1/2-length winner of the Grade 3 Texas Mile over Mr Ross and Five Straight in his most recent start, running the race in near track-record time and earning a 110 Beyer Speed Figure. That race was Dixie Dot Com's seventh win from 19 career starts, and the victory pushed the 6-year-old's earnings to $862,775. A win Monday would be worth $180,000, which would improve his bankroll to $1,042,775.

Making a millionaire out of Dixie Dot Com, whose career has been compromised by recurring injuries, has been a goal for trainer Bill Morey Jr.

Said Morey: "It's been something in the back of my mind that I was hoping we could achieve because we had so many other deals for this horse that just didn't pan out: the Kentucky Derby, the Strub, the Santa Anita Big Cap. We were talking really, really big things."

Dixie Dot Com, who will retire to stud in California after this year, has trained well since the Texas Mile.

"If we could be fortunate to run back as good as we did last time, it's going to be very challenging for the rest of them," said Morey. "We have not missed a scheduled gallop or work, and whenever we can lead this horse over with no interruptions in his training schedule, he has the eye [of the tiger]."

David Flores, who won last year's Lone Star Park Handicap with Luftikus, rides Dixie Dot Com, who is the 118-pound highweight. Remington Rock, winner of the Grade 3 Fifth Season Breeders' Cup, is the second highweight at 114 for trainer Richard Jackson.