At least 10 expected for Cigar Mile

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – A field of at least 10 is expected for the Grade 1, $750,000 Cigar Mile, a race traditionally run the Saturday after Thanksgiving that this year was moved back to Dec. 2 to accommodate horses who may have run in a Breeders’ Cup race on Nov. 4.

Three horses coming out of Breeders’ Cup races are expected for the Cigar Mile, including Sharp Azteca and Practical Joke, second and fourth, respectively, in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, and Mind Your Biscuits, third in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint.

On Tuesday, Mind Your Biscuits, worked five furlongs in 59.96 seconds over Belmont Park’s main track. With new rider Irad Ortiz Jr. up, Mind Your Biscuits began his work about six lengths behind stablemate Maimo, a 2-year-old maiden. Mind Your Biscuits went his opening quarter in 24.07 and came to the top of the lane in 35.26, gradually advancing toward his workmate. Mind Your Biscuits caught Maimo by the three-sixteenths pole and came home mostly on his own before galloping out six furlongs in 1:13.53 and seven furlongs in 1:26.81.

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Trainer Chad Summers, who said he liked what he saw from Mind Your Biscuits, noted it would be the most serious move Mind Your Biscuits will have in the four weeks between the Breeders’ Cup and the Cigar Mile. Mind Your Biscuits could blow out a quarter or three furlongs next week.

Ortiz will replace Joel Rosario who had ridden Mind Your Biscuits in his last six starts and 11 of 18 overall. Rosario will ride Practical Joke in the Cigar Mile. Ortiz rode Mind Your Biscuits once, winning a New York-bred maiden race by 7 1/2 lengths at Aqueduct in April 2016.

“He loved him when he breezed him before the Breeders’ Cup,” Summers said. “I’m excited to have him ride us in the Cigar Mile.”

With riders, the Cigar Mile field is expected to include Americanize (Rafael Bejarano); Beasley (Junior Alvarado); Mind Your Biscuits (Irad Ortiz Jr.); Neolithic (undecided); Practical Joke (Joel Rosario); Seymourdini (Jose Ortiz); Sharp Azteca (Javier Castellano); Summer Revolution (undecided); Tale of S’avall (John Velazquez); and Tom’s Ready (Mike Smith). Vulcan’s Forge is a possible starter.