Liz's Cable Girl one to topple in rescheduled Spruce Fir
Multiple stakes winner Liz’s Cable Girl looms large in a short field for Friday’s rescheduled $75,000 Spruce Fir Handicap for New Jersey-bred fillies and mares going six furlongs at Monmouth Park, as the track resumes stakes action following an eventful weekend.
The Spruce Fir anchors an 11-race card Friday at Monmouth, with those races all having been shifted from their scheduled Sunday position after the Oceanport, N.J., track announced a cancellation due to excessive heat. Last Saturday, Monmouth had carded its biggest day of the season, with five graded stakes headlined by the Grade 1 Haskell Invitational. With tracks around the region canceled due to the heat, Monmouth began its original 14-race program as scheduled in early afternoon, but after running two races, the track canceled all the non-stakes races and ran a stakes-only program beginning at 6 p.m. Shortly after Maximum Security won the Haskell to cap that program, the track announced it would cancel the Sunday card and run the entire program as drawn Friday.
The six canceled races from Saturday’s Haskell card will be drawn as extra races this Saturday and Sunday, as will the original book races for Friday.
The consistent Liz’s Cable Girl, who will have Jose Ferrer in the irons for trainer Patrick McBurney, has won 11 of 18 starts, including five of her seven most recent outings while competing regularly against open company. In fact, her only start against New Jersey-breds in her last seven starts was a win in the Eleven North Handicap at Monmouth over Cee Bee Gee Bee, whom she meets again Friday. Liz’s Cable Girl then won the Roamin Rachel Stakes at Parx Racing, where she also won an optional claimer against open company. She most recently finished third in an optional-claiming race at Laurel Park.
Cee Bee Gee Bee will be making her first start since October. She is trained by Jason Servis, with Nik Juarez named to ride.
Crazy Daisy and Billy’s Jump Start were second and third in the Smart N Classy Stakes in June at Monmouth and cut back from the one-mile distance of that race. Jersey Rich, fifth in both outings this year, and Sassy Chub, an optional-claiming winner at Monmouth last time out, round out the field of six.