G T Five Hundred in top form since Maker claim; $32,631 pick six carryover

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – The well-traveled G T Five Hundred, coming off the two best speed figures of his 28-race career, looks well-spotted to remain in solid form when he heads a field of six entered Sunday in a starter allowance at Aqueduct.

The six-furlong race is open to horses who have started for a claiming price of $50,000 or less and have not won a race other than maiden or claiming. There is another starter allowance on the card with the same conditions, but that one is scheduled for one mile.

Trainer Mike Maker claimed G T Five Hundred for $40,000 on Nov. 22 at Churchill Downs in a race where the gelded son of Astern stumbled at the break and finished seventh in an eight-horse field.

Maker took him to Turfway Park, where G T Five Hundred ended his 4-year-old campaign with a monster 8 1/2-length victory at the same $40,000 level. It was G T Five Hundred’s second win from three starts over Turfway’s Tapeta surface.

However, Maker opted to put G T Five Hundred back on dirt and shipped him to Aqueduct, where on Jan. 17 he ran in this same starter condition going seven furlongs. After stalking the pacesetting Master Freud, G T Five Hundred made a clear lead in midstretch only to get run down late by Heard On Thestreet. G T Five Hundred finished second, 6 1/4 lengths clear of the rest of the field.

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“He had handled dirt fine and we don’t get that condition at Turfway so hate to give that condition away,” Maker said on why he shipped the horse to New York and moved him back to dirt.

Maker said choosing to run at six furlongs, a distance at which he has recorded four of his five career victories, was rather easy.

“We were a little suspect at the seven-eighths to begin with,” he said.

In Sunday’s sixth race, G T Five Hundred is coming back in two weeks, but just about everybody in here is coming back on relatively short rest.

“He came out of it well, he’s a good-feeling horse,” Maker said.

Quick Hammer will likely try to wire this field in his first start off the claim for Linda Rice, who took the son of Mor Spirit for $10,000 out of a 9 1/4-length win in which he earned a 96 Beyer Speed Figure, a career top by 20 points.

The other speed in this field comes from Muazarah, who was a nine-length winner Dec. 27 when running for $25,000.

Hatch comes into this race with nearly four weeks’ rest off a second-place finish behind Master of Arms in this same condition Jan. 4. Two horses out of that race, Heard On Thestreet and Abadin, came back to win their next outs.

In Sunday’s seventh, Ragazzo Diabolico is a threat to wire the field from the rail under Romero Maragh. Ragazzo Diabolico set the pace and finished third going a mile in a $40,000 claimer on Jan. 3.

Rice sends out the uncoupled pair of Blown Cover, who in his first start since July would be stretching out to a mile, and Waitlist, who is turning back to a mile following a sixth-place finish going 1 1/8 miles in this condition Jan. 11.

Cyclone State to Saudi Derby

Cyclone State, winner of the Jerome Stakes on Jan. 4 at Aqueduct, will make his next start in the $1.5 million Saudi Derby on Feb. 22 at King Abdulaziz Racecourse in Riyadh, trainer Chad Summers said Friday.

Summers confirmed the Saudi Derby after Cyclone State worked five furlongs in 1:00 at the Palm Meadows training center in South Florida. According to Summers, Cyclone State started off about six lengths behind a horse trained by Jose D’Angelo and finished four in front.

“This was the big work to help make that decision, and it looks like we’re headed overseas,” Summers said. “We’ve had success over there before. We think we know the type of horse to be competitive, and we think he fits the mold.”

Summers had success in Dubai with Mind Your Biscuits, who won back-to-back runnings of the Dubai Golden Shaheen in 2017-18.

Summers said he’s hopeful that Cyclone State can run in both the Saudi Derby and the U.A.E. Derby in Dubai on April 5. Cyclone State would need to be invited to the U.A.E. Derby.

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Cyclone State has won three consecutive one-turn mile races at Aqueduct, and the Saudi Derby is run at that same configuration with a big purse.

“This is the right spot for being an unknown,” Summers said, referring to Cyclone State’s status as a Kentucky Derby candidate.

Luis Rivera Jr., aboard for Cyclone State’s three wins, and his last four starts overall, flew down from New York to work the horse. Summers said Rivera will go to Saudi Arabia to ride him as well.

◗ Andrew Byrnes will retire as stakes coordinator for the New York Racing Association at the end of this summer’s Saratoga meet, it was announced Friday. Byrnes has worked in that capacity since the summer of 1999. His tenure at NYRA dates back to 1984.

Byrnes will assist in interviewing, selecting, and training a new stakes coordinator following a national search that will commence in the coming weeks, according to a NYRA press release.

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