Keeneland: Jenny Wiley next for Tepin

Trainer Mark Casse said he has pinpointed the $350,000 Jenny Wiley on April 16 at Keeneland as the next race for Tepin instead of pitting the star turf mare against male rivals again in the $300,000 Maker’s 46 Mile the day beforehand. Both are Grade 1 turf races.

Tepin ended her 2015 season by defeating the boys in the Breeders’ Cup Mile, earning a divisional Eclipse Award. The 5-year-old mare is 2 for 2 this year, with both starts coming at Tampa Bay Downs, and brings a four-race win streak into the Jenny Wiley, a 1 1/16-mile race for which she’ll surely be a heavy favorite.

“We’d talked about the Maker’s, but that was before she ran so well with a little longer distance in both her races at Tampa,” said Casse. “You put the races side-by-side, and the bottom line is there’s no reason to run against colts if you don’t have to.”

Casse added that he is hoping to make the May 6 Alysheba Stakes at Churchill with Noble Bird, who was beaten a head in that Grade 2 race last year by Protonico. Noble Bird then won the Grade 1 Stephen Foster later in the meet.

“We might run him in the [April 16] Ben Ali at Keeneland before then,” he said. “He has to start training better.”

Casse also confirmed that Airoforce, the likely favorite Saturday in the Spiral Stakes at Turfway Park, is his lone Kentucky Derby possibility. The 3-year-old Conquest Big E is getting time off and probably will race on turf when he returns, while Riker is being pointed to the Pat Day Mile on the May 7 Derby undercard.