Domestic Spending should send the Mister D. off with a bang

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – Before Arlington goes black, it’s time for one more round of Brown.

Chad Brown has won more Arlington Millions, four, than any other trainer, surpassing the three-packs accumulated by turf legends Charlie Whittingham and Ron McAnally. Brown, in fact, won the last three Millions, with Beach Patrol in 2017, Robert Bruce in 2018, and Bricks and Mortar in 2019, and in 2019, he swept the three Grade 1s on Arlington’s card, winning the Beverly D. with Sistercharlie and the Secretariat with Valid Point.

Brown would love to stride triumphant Saturday into this venerated racecourse, where he has sent North America’s top turf horse, Domestic Spending, to race. Instead, this is a major race day depressingly framed. The Million now is called the Mister D. Stakes, its purse trimmed to $600,000, and Domestic Spending will be heavily favored in what’s expected to be the first and last renewal of a famed race renamed and reduced. Arlington is for sale to developers, the 2021 season the track’s last. After Aug. 14, 19 race cards remain this meet. After that, the Arlington doors are expected to swing closed for the last time.

Domestic Spending could lift the pall, at least for the afternoon. The 4-year-old gelding has won six of his seven starts, including three straight Grade 1s, his lone loss a fine third-place finish a year ago in the Hall of Fame at Saratoga. By Kingman and owned by Seth Klarman’s Klaravich Stables, Domestic Spending possesses an electric turn of foot, with the athleticism to hit holes and make multiple moves. And after winning by less than one length in his first five races, Domestic Spending broke through June 5 in the Grade 1 Manhattan with a 2 3/4-length score. As good as this horse already has gotten – and he comes off a career-best 106 Beyer Speed Figure – there’s good reason to think he still is improving.

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“He’s much stronger, finishing his works a lot stronger,” Brown said. “It was certainly nice to see him finish off his race that way.”

Bricks and Mortar, who went from the Million to win the Breeders’ Cup Turf – Brown is contemplating the same move with Domestic Spending – topped out at 107 Beyer. Sistercharlie, the Brown-trained champion mare, peaked at a 106. Domestic Spending, still lightly raced, and with no stallion career calling, could turn into something special even by Brown’s lofty standards.

“On speed figures, he’s as fast as any of them,” Brown said. “He has more to accomplish to fill out the résumé to get there, but it’s really impressive the way he’s developed.”

Flavien Prat, aboard for the two starts this year, rides Domestic Spending. The hottest jockey in the country the last month, Prat has yet to win at Arlington.

“He’s a horse that gives you confidence,” Prat said. “He puts himself in the race, he’s really handy, and he can adapt himself pretty well.”

Nine others went in the Mister D., though Another Mystery will likely opt for the Black Tie Affair Stakes later on the card. Domestic Spending has a good draw, post 3, in a 1 1/4-mile race that starts, awkwardly, at the end of the far turn.

If Domestic Spending runs his race, avoids trouble, he probably wins, and the only horse who appears to have any real chance at an upset is the Aidan O’Brien-trained Armory. Four-year-old Armory was a good 2-year-old and 3-year-old, just a notch below the very best in Europe, and has an affinity for flat, turning tracks like those in America. He showed that last year shipping to Australia to finish second in the Group 1 Cox Plate and even more so in a sharp win to start his 2021 campaign, a three-length victory over a solid bunch in the Group 2 Huxley at Chester, a very tight course with left-handed bends. Last out, at another somewhat American-style racecourse, York, Armory was a close fourth in the paceless York Stakes. Ryan Moore last rode Armory at Chester and has the mount Saturday.

“We always thought this was a race would suit him,” O’Brien said. “He’s a pacey horse going a mile and a quarter over a flat track, and he likes travelling. I imagine he’ll be handy in the race, but Ryan will decide that.”

Eight-year-old Zulu Alpha, one of the top American turf horses late in 2019 and through the first part of 2020, returned from a 10-month layoff with a flat fifth last month in the Arlington Stakes.

“I think he’s going to take a step forward, but he’s going to need two steps forward to win,” said trainer Mike Maker, who plotted a three-race summer campaign leading into the Calumet Turf Cup next month at Kentucky Downs.

Maker’s second runner, Glynn County, has a better chance. An improving 4-year-old, he turned in a solid run for fifth in his Grade 1 debut, the United Nations on July 17 at Monmouth.

“Typical Kitten’s Joy, late-maturing horse. I expect him to have better things ahead,” Maker said.

Overseas shipper Space Traveller stays in the United States and runs for new trainer Brendan Walsh, and while he could handle a stretch in distance from one-mile races, Space Traveller looks a cut below what’s required here. Bizzee Channel and Two Emmys ran one-two in the Arlington; both bring speed to the Mister D.

“He ran like a monster last time,” said Bizzee Channel’s trainer, Larry Rivelli. “But he didn’t have Chad Brown chasing him.”