Lecomte top three to meet again on front end of Risen Star

Tuesday in New Orleans will be the quietest Mardi Gras ever. COVID-19, which spread through the city after Mardi Gras 2020, has smothered the annual public bacchanal. Not even the famous parades Rex, and Zulu, and Endymion, which snakes a couple blocks from the Fair Grounds, will roll.

You could call the Lecomte Stakes last month at Fair Grounds a veritable parade: The horses that raced first, second, and third into the first turn were first, second, and third at the finish. Those three – Midnight Bourbon, Proxy, and Mandaloun – are back for another round of 3-year-old dirt-route stakes racing Saturday in the Grade 2, $400,000 Risen Star.

New Orleans, wrapped in a blanket of damp chill through the weekend and into Mardi Gras, will be strangely quiet, and the public is not yet allowed to go racing, but the Saturday program at Fair Grounds feels like finding the baby in the king cake.

The six-stakes card ends on race 13, the Risen Star, a last shiny strand of beads laid over a bunch of other fine races. The Rachel Alexandra matches Kentucky Oaks hopefuls Travel Column and Clairiere, while undefeated Maxfield, a potential budding star at age 4, tops a fine renewal of the Mineshaft Stakes. Factor This, the best turf horse at Fair Grounds last winter, is back from a couple months in Florida to try and win his second straight Fair Grounds Stakes.

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There probably won’t be enough rain this week to move the Saturday turf stakes to dirt, but race 5, the cashing leg of the early pick 5, could wind up on the main track if too much rain falls. First post for a card loaded with promising maidens is noon Central.

The Risen Star, contested over 1 1/8 miles, is the first 85-point Kentucky Derby qualifying race. Churchill Downs determines the 20-horse Derby field through points-awarding races on the “Road to the Kentucky Derby,” and the first four finishers in the Risen Star get 50, 20, 10, and five, respectively. Any horse using Lasix isn’t eligible for the points and none race on the anti-bleeder medication Saturday. Senor Buscador, who will take betting, makes his first start sans Lasix and raced on it when he won the Springboard Mile, also part of the Road to the Kentucky Derby.

Thirteen were entered in the Risen Star but Keepmeinmind isn’t shipping from Oaklawn Park and Defeater will opt for a Saturday allowance. Beep Beep, Carillo, or Sermononthemount would be a shock winner, Rightandjust slightly less so. The rest have some sort of plausible chance.

Midnight Bourbon, who has started five times and never raced on Lasix, turned in the sort of performance every horseman with a talented prospect wants to see early in a 3-year-old campaign – a step forward from 2-year-old form. Breaking from the rail under Joe Talamo (subbing for named jockey Ricardo Santana Jr., who was scratched sick the day of the race), Midnight Bourbon cruised to a comfortable lead in the 1 1/16-mile Lecomte and never was headed, winning by one length.

Midnight Bourbon drifted slightly in the very late stages, possibly tiring in his first start since finishing a distant third in the Grade 1 Champagne on Oct. 10. That mainly suggests the colt, by Tiznow out of the awesome broodmare Catch the Moon, can move forward Saturday. Trainer Steve Asmussen’s last Lecomte winner, Pyro, won the Risen Star and the Louisiana Derby.

“He’s a beautiful mover, a big, gorgeous horse that travels really well,” Asmussen said. “I don’t think he’s going to have any trouble going farther.”

Midnight Bourbon does not need the lead but could wind up there anyway. Rail-drawn Starrininmydreams has speed but trainer, co-owner, and co-breeder Dallas Stewart said he doesn’t want his horse winging while trying 1 1/8 miles in his first start since Nov. 22. Rightandjust went wire to wire winning a Jan. 16 allowance race but is drawn widest and might not be quick enough to make the front.

Mandaloun races in blinkers for the first time after turning in a solid Lecomte performance that didn’t square with a reputation that made him the 4-5 favorite last month despite making his stakes and two-turn debut. Brad Cox, Mandaloun’s trainer, said the colt, a Juddmonte Farms homebred by Into Mischief, had trained in blinkers at times before the Lecomte, and isn’t sure how beneficial they’ll be. Cox still foresees improvement.

“It looks like he’s put on weight and matured the last four weeks. His numbers went the right way and I like him second time around two turns,” Cox said.

Mandaloun edged in front of Proxy during the Lecomte stretch run but Proxy came back to finish second, taking a serious step forward after two front-running dirt-route victories aided by soft fractions. Proxy, a Godolphin homebred with an elite pedigree (by Tapit out of multiple Grade 1-winner Panty Raid) has come back with two very encouraging works, said his trainer, Mike Stidham. The first was a solo half-mile with a strong gallop-out, the second a five-furlong drill in company with older horse Mystic Guide, a Grade 2 winner.

“He’s definitely progressing,” Stidham said. “I think we’re going into the race as good as we can hope to.”

Senor Buscador faces much stronger competition but was dazzling Dec. 18 in the Springboard Mile. Trainer Todd Fincher thinks a long spell in the starting gate after loading into post 1 lulled Senor Buscador into complacency, leading to a slow break and a last-to-first trip. Senor Buscador, making a sustained run that bodes well for his chances at 1 1/8 miles, circled nine rivals around the far turn and into the stretch, posting a 5 3/4-length victory that produced a Risen Star-best 93 Beyer Speed Figure. The colt, by Mineshaft, also went last to first in his debut sprint win.

“It’s not by design, what he’s done, and he has more speed than he’s shown, as you can see at the end of his races,” Fincher said.

Starrininmydreams makes his 3-year-old and stakes debut following a maiden sprint win and a wet-track allowance-route victory last fall in Kentucky.

“He hasn’t missed a beat and has been working strongly; looks like his head is in the game,” said Stewart. “He’s got a little bit of speed, so he can get places.”

O Besos enters on a two-race win streak and scored an impressive stretch-running sprint allowance victory Jan. 16 at Fair Grounds. Santa Cruiser got squeezed at the start of the Lecomte and after showing speed in a one-turn-mile maiden win at Churchill was out the back door early last month, rallying encouragingly for fourth.

And that’s the Risen Star. Laissez le bon temps rouler – it’s Mardi Gras in New Orleans.