Hall of Dreams gives Husbands big shot at sixth Breeders' Stakes win

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Jockey Patrick Husbands has won the $400,000 Breeders’ Stakes a record five times. The journeyman will try to add to that total on Sunday at Woodbine aboard Hall of Dreams in the anchor leg of the Canadian Triple Crown over 1 1/2 miles on the main turf.

Hall of Dreams is coming off a runner-up finish behind the seven-length winner Moira in the $1 million Queen’s Plate. Trainer Mark Casse opted to bypass the next Triple Crown race, the Prince of Wales on the dirt at Fort Erie, with Hall of Dreams, a gelded son of Belmont Stakes winner Lemon Drop Kid.

“We breezed Hall of Dreams on the dirt before the Prince of Wales and just felt that he handled it okay,” Casse said. “He’s bred up and down for the grass, so we decided to bypass the race for the Breeders’, and he’s trained very well for it.”

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Hall of Dreams has raced exclusively on Tapeta. The Casse-trained Plate Trial Stakes victor Sir for Sure, who was third in the Plate, is also experimenting on the grass after losing his rider on the first turn in the Wales.

“The biggest thing we know about the Breeders’ is that both Sir for Sure and Hall of Dreams will relish the mile and a half,” Casse said. “Both their breeding says turf, but what the breeding says and what they do can be two different things. They’re both doing well heading into the race, and hopefully they both have a good race on Sunday.”

Duke of Love notched his first stakes win in the 1 3/16-mile Wales with a pace-pressing trip over a muddy track under Justin Stein.

“Duke broke really well,” Stein said. “His stride was comfy right away. I wasn’t worried about the dirt at all, the way he was traveling over it. We had a nice, clean trip on the outside. He got to relax. A track like this, there’s even more kickback when it’s heavy and wet and sloppy. It makes it a lot easier for a horse if they’re not thinking about running into the slop.”

After a troubled fourth in the Trial, Duke of Love finished a non-threatening eighth in the Plate. The handsome son of Cupid failed to relax in a stalking position before fading to fifth in his lone turf start, the Dec. 3 Pulpit Stakes at Gulfstream Park. He has evolved into a much better runner since then for trainer Josie Carroll.

The blue-blooded Sam-Son Farm runner Dancin in Da’nile was a troubled third in his season opener in allowance company on the inner turf. He went on to finish fifth in both the Trial and Plate.

“I think he loves the turf,” trainer Gail Cox said. “The first race this year was his first start back against older horses, and he did get bounced around at the top of the lane. I don’t think [the distance] will be an issue. It’s far, but I think he can handle it. He’s a much more mature horse now. He’s more focused. He’s always handled everything well, which is something that has remained the same.”

By Pioneerof the Nile, Dancin in Da’Nile’s fourth dam is the legendary 1991 Canadian Triple Crown winner Dance Smartly.

The once-beaten Moira bypassed the Wales and is also skipping the Breeders’, with bigger fish to fry. Her large ownership group and trainer Kevin Attard send out Gaston, who graduated over 1 1/16 miles on the grass on Plate Day here Aug. 21.

“He’s by Hard Spun and out of a Galileo mare, so he’s bred to run the mile and a half distance,” Attard said. “He gets over the turf very well. He relaxes well and waits for the rider to ask him, then kicks in. In a race like this, you need a horse with that running style.”

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Ice Road, a $40,000 claim in June by trainer Mike Dunslow and owner Bruno Schickedanz, ran the race of his life when third in the Wales. The son of Keen Ice is competing on turf for the first time Sunday.

“I kinda rushed him into the Prince of Wales, but he came out of it good,” Dunslow said.

The 130th running of the Breeders’ attracted three other Canadian-bred 3-year-olds – Lac Macaza, Shamateur, and Collaborative.

The Breeders’ goes as the ninth on an 11-race card with a 1:10 p.m. post time.

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