Fair Grounds: Mylute launches comeback in allowance

With a neck loss in the Louisiana Derby, a fifth-place finish in the Kentucky Derby, and a third-place finish in the Preakness Stakes, Mylute stamped himself as one of the elite members of the 3-year-old class of 2013. Where he fits among the best older dirt-route horses in the country is an open question, and one that the featured seventh race on Thursday at Fair Grounds should begin to answer.

Mylute is one of seven horses entered in a second-level allowance race open to $40,000 claimers and carded for one mile and 70 yards on the main track. The race marks his first start since the Jim Dandy Stakes last July 27 at Saratoga, a race in which Mylute finished eighth. Coincidentally, the Jim Dandy’s seventh-place finisher, Perfect Title, also makes his first start since that race Thursday.

Mylute had been under consideration for the New Orleans Handicap on Saturday, but trainer Tom Amoss said after discussions with owners Gold Mark Farm and Mandy Pope, Thursday’s race emerged as a more appealing option.

“We have a big year planned for Mylute and we want to make him one of the best handicap horses in the country,” Amoss said. “This is a good first step.”

Mylute should be fit enough to win his allowance comeback, and he clearly handled the Fair Grounds surface in his three starts at the meet last season. Mylute, a son of Midnight Lute, had been breezing at Gold Mark’s training track in Florida before shipping to Fair Grounds in January, and he has posted five published workouts locally, a pattern highlighted by a six-furlong move in 1:12.40 on March 15.

Handicappers interested in beating the favorite might look past the long-layoff comebacker Perfect Title and toward Battled Hardened, who should be prominently placed through a moderate early tempo, and is positively raised in class after being claimed out of a March 7 win by Karl Broberg, whose stock has been performing well recently in New Orleans.