Gulfstream Park: Mott, Clement look ahead

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Bill Mott had a big weekend, winning races with Pinball and West Coast Girl on Saturday and Unbridled Ocean on Sunday. The Hall of Fame trainer will try to add a couple more Grade 1 wins to his resume this coming weekend when he sends out respective key contenders Lea and Amira’s Prince in the Donn and Gulfstream Park Turf handicaps.

Mott will take on Eclipse Award winner Will Take Charge with Lea in the nine-furlong Donn. Lea earned his way into the race with a convincing 3 1/4-length victory in the Grade 3 Hal’s Hope one month earlier. Lea, a homebred son of First Samurai, joined Mott’s barn late last season.

“He’s doing well, but it looks like it’s coming up a big, competitive field,” Mott said. “I’m not familiar with some of the horses they told me were running in the Donn. But Will Take Charge, I know who he is.”

[Clocker Reports: Get Mike Welsch’s clocker reports from Gulfstream Park and Palm Meadows]

Among the others expect to run in the Donn are Revolutionary, Neck ’n Neck, River Seven, Romansh, Uncaptured, Bourbon Courage, and Joshua’s Comprise.

Amira’s Prince will bring a four-race win streak into the Gulfstream Park Turf but has not started since winning the Grade 2 Mervin Muniz at the Fair Grounds last March. He also captured the Grade 2 Mac Diarmida here in February 2013.

“He wasn’t moving well, so we turned him out for 90 days, brought him back, and he’s done fine ever since,” Mott said. “He just needed a vacation. He never had any surgeries. He’s doing well now, and I hope he can pick it up where we left off with him last year.”

Mott also updated the status of Cigar Street, the extremely talented son of Street Sense who is owned by Jake Ballis and the Miami Heat’s Rashard Lewis.

Cigar Street was perfect in three starts here during the 2012-13 meet but has been away since capturing the Grade 3 Skip Away on March 30.

“He’s in Ocala,” Mott said. “I sent him home in April, he was back in training on the farm, and I guess he had a setback. I was really looking forward to having him back this year.”

Mott’s Payson Park neighbor Christophe Clement will counter Amira’s Prince in the Gulfstream Park Turf with Summer Front, who may be favored to notch his first Grade 1 victory off his recent triumph in the Grade 2 Fort Lauderdale and a near miss six weeks earlier in the Grade 2 Citation at Hollywood Park.

“He’s doing great, training well, breezed on Sunday – his last work – and we’re real excited,” Clement said.

Amira’s Prince and Summer Front were both assigned 117 pounds for the Gulfstream Park Turf, two fewer than likely starting highweight Boisterous. Others expected to run include Imagining and Nikki’s Sandcastle.

Clement also said his promising 3-year-old prospect Tonalist, an impressive maiden winner around two turns here last month, should be ready to run back within the next couple of weeks. Tonalist, a son of Tapit, rallied five wide to a four-length maiden special weight victory going 1 1/8 miles on Jan. 18, for which he earned a 90 Beyer Speed Figure.

“He had a nice, easy maintenance work on Sunday,” Clement said. “We had two or three options possible over the next two weeks. I’ll work him back next week and then I’ll make my mind up after that. He’s a lovely horse; you have to be very excited. The dam is by Pleasant Colony, so he’s got all the makings of a horse who’ll stay long on the dirt. And if you believe in numbers, his numbers were very good.”