Keep Quiet back at site of big win for turf allowance

Keep Quiet was a Grade 3 winner at Keeneland as a juvenile. Now a 5-year-old gelding in a different barn, he returns to the site of his biggest win for Wednesday’s fifth race, one of two turf-mile allowances that anchor the card.

Keep Quiet will have Joel Rosario aboard in the $83,000 allowance. Keep Quiet was a stellar juvenile in 2016 for the Mark Casse barn, finishing second in the Grade 2 With Anticipation Stakes at Saratoga and winning the Grade 3 Bourbon Stakes at Keeneland before finishing eighth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf. But physical issues sidelined him for more than a year. He returned in 2018 to make six starts, all in allowance and claiming company, tallying two seconds along with a third-place finish in an allowance at Keeneland behind subsequent stakes winner Mr Cub.

Owner Gary Barber, who has horses on both coasts, transferred him to trainer Peter Miller in California, and Keep Quiet has seemed to find a spark. He won an optional-claiming race in January at Santa Anita, then finished second in his most recent outing in February. His Beyer Speed Figures of 89 and 90 from those two starts rank among the best in this field, and his career earnings of $329,503 lead this field, which includes other stakes performers.

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The top figure belongs to Magic Tapit, a lightly raced horse who appears to be on the upswing since returning from a 14-month layoff for trainer Roger Attfield. The 5-year-old has made just five starts and has never finished worse than third. In his second start off the layoff, he won an allowance in January at Gulfstream Park, posting a Beyer of 102.

The field also includes Grade 3-placed Cuestion de Tiempo; Cullum Road, who was second by a head in the Dueling Grounds Derby last fall at Kentucky Downs; and multiple stakes-placed Nobrag Justfact.

Several stakes winners also factor in Wednesday’s seventh race, an $87,000 allowance for fillies and mares. Contributing, trained by Brad Cox and to be ridden by Florent Geroux, won the Pan Zareta Stakes in January at Fair Grounds but is now dropping after going unplaced in two subsequent stakes.

Bonnie Arch won the Ellis Park Turf Stakes last summer, and In the Moon was Grade 3-placed last year. Fizzy Friday and In the Lee are both stakes-placed.