Goldencents works ahead of 2014 debut set for Metropolitan Mile

ARCADIA, Calif. – Goldencents, the winner of the Santa Anita Derby and Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile in 2013, worked seven furlongs from the gate in 1:21.97 between races Sunday at Santa Anita, preparing for his 2014 debut in the $1.5 million Metropolitan Mile Handicap at Belmont Park on June 7.

Trainer Doug O’Neill said the brisk workout was designed as a prep race. O’Neill said he would have preferred an allowance race for Goldencents but that a suitable race did not fill. Goldencents has not started since finishing seventh in the Grade 1 Cigar Mile at Aqueduct last November.

“We wanted an allowance prep, and this was the next best thing,” he said. “That will be treated like a race.”

Jockey Rafael Bejarano rode Goldencents in the workout, which began 6 1/2 furlongs from the wire and continued a sixteenth of a mile past the finish line. Working alone, Goldencents ran the first quarter-mile in 22.25 seconds and a half-mile in 45 seconds. Goldencents was timed in 1:09.25 for six furlongs.

Owned by Glenn Sorgenstein and Josh Kaplan, Goldencents has won 5 of 13 starts and $1,994,000. Following the Santa Anita Derby in April 2013, Goldencents was 17th in the Kentucky Derby and fifth in the Preakness Stakes.

Goldencents, a 4-year-old colt by Into Mischief, was second in three consecutive sprints last summer and fall – the Grade 1 Bing Crosby, Grade 2 Pat O’Brien, and Grade 1 Santa Anita Sprint Championship – before winning the BC Dirt Mile here last November.