Hollywood Park: Ellis puts Centralinteligence, Rail Trip on different paths

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Trainer Ron Ellis said Sunday that Centralinteligence and Rail Trip emerged from the Grade 1 Triple Bend Handicap on Saturday “perfect,” but they are headed in different directions in the next two months.

Centralinteligence, who scored the first stakes win of his career in the Triple Bend, will get a vacation during the summer and will not run at Del Mar. His next start will be the Grade 1 Santa Anita Sprint Championship – formerly the Ancient Title – as a prep for the Breeders’ Cup Sprint on Nov. 2 at Santa Anita.

“He didn’t run well at Del Mar the one time he ran there, and he’s never trained well there,” Ellis said. “I think Santa Anita is his favorite track. It’s hard to find a horse who likes Santa Anita and also likes Polytrack at Del Mar.”

Centralinteligence earned a fees-paid berth into the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile with the victory in the seven-furlong Triple Bend, but Ellis is reluctant to stretch him out around two turns before the Breeders’ Cup. Under the Breeders’ Cup rules, however, even though Centralinteligence doesn’t have an automatic berth in the Sprint, the horse’s owners can apply the entry fee for the Dirt Mile toward the entry fee for the Sprint, which lessens the overall cost should he run there.

Rail Trip, fifth in the Triple Bend in his first start since November, will stretch out to 1 1/16 miles and defend his title in the Grade 2, $200,000 San Diego Handicap at Del Mar on July 27, Ellis said.

“You can’t get any easy allowance races anymore, so I had to bring him back in a stakes,” Ellis said of Rail Trip, an 8-year-old gelding. “He ran fine for his first race back.”