Maxfield odds-on in closing-day Stephen Foster
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LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The Grade 1s will come soon enough. First, however, comes what figures as a routine test for Maxfield when the Godolphin homebred goes postward Saturday as a heavy favorite in the 40th running of the Grade 2 Stephen Foster, the highlight of a sensational closing-day card of the Churchill Downs spring meet.
Maxfield, with Jose Ortiz in from New York to ride, figures in the 2-5 range when facing eight other older horses in trying for his seventh victory in eight career starts. The 4-year-old colt is already a Grade 1 winner, having captured the Breeders’ Futurity at 2, and trainer Brendan Walsh is using the $600,000 Foster as a stepping-stone to major races such as the Whitney and Breeders’ Cup Classic. The Foster is a Win and You’re In toward the Nov. 6 BC Classic at Del Mar.
Maxfield will break from post 8 in the 1 1/8-mile Foster when making his first start since drawing off to a 3 1/4-length score in the Grade 2 Alysheba on the April 30 Kentucky Oaks undercard at Churchill. The dark bay Street Sense colt trained strongly at Keeneland in the interim before assimilating back into the Brendan Walsh string at Churchill ahead of his final pre-race work here last weekend.
“He’s a fit and happy horse, doing just super,” said Walsh. “We’re ready to go and excited to get this race under way.”
Maxfield has overcome a couple of stoppages earlier in his career to emerge as one of the leading older horses in America today. The colt was scratched from the BC Juvenile in November 2019 with a minor ankle injury, and he missed most of his 3-year-old season when suffering a non-displaced condylar fracture of his right front leg in a Keeneland workout last June.
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Fortunately for Walsh and Godolphin, surgery and the subsequent recovery went perfectly. Maxfield returned in December with back-to-back stakes wins at Fair Grounds, then was dealt his only defeat to date when finishing third as the highweight and favorite in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap in March. He rebounded with a career-high 105 Beyer Speed Figure in dominating the Alysheba with Ortiz up.
“He just keeps going,” Walsh said after the Alysheba. “He’s a remarkable horse.”
Maxfield, listed at 4-5 on the morning line, will be looking to become one of the heaviest favorites to win the Foster, which had been a Grade 1 for 17 years until being downgraded by the American Graded Stakes Committee in 2019, when the race conditions also happened to be converted from handicap to allowances. Curlin paid $2.80 when romping in 2008, and Gun Runner won at a $3 mutuel in 2017. The Foster also has produced huge longshot winners such as Colonial Colony (62-1 in 2004) and Seek Gold (91-1 in 2006), and if for some reason Maxfield stubs his toe Saturday, the tote could light up again.
Among those trying to pull an upset are Visitant (post 9, James Graham) and Chess Chief (post 1, John Velazquez), the respective two-three finishers in the Alysheba; Warrior’s Charge (post 6, Florent Geroux), a two-time graded winner for the ever-dangerous Brad Cox; Silver Dust (post 5, Adam Beschizza), a multiple graded winner who is less than $25,000 shy of the $1 million earnings mark; and a pair of also-rans from the 2020 Kentucky Derby, Necker Island (post 3, Mitchell Murrill) and South Bend (post 7, Tyler Gaffalione).
Necker Island comes off a gutsy allowance score for trainer Chris Hartman, who has enjoyed an uncanny meet. Into Thursday action, Hartman had won with 13 of 34 starters, including a torrid patch earlier this month in which he won six races in a row.
Silver Dust was a late scratch from a May 29 allowance at Churchill when being uncharacteristically fractious in the starting gate. The popular 7-year-old gelding has since breezed three times for trainer Bret Calhoun.
Rounding out the lineup are Empty Tomb (post 2, Ricardo Santana Jr.) and Sprawl (post 4, Brian Hernandez Jr.).
There’s plenty of pace signed on, meaning Maxfield probably will sit a mid-pack trip before moving along. Warrior’s Charge, Visitant, and maybe Empty Tomb and Sprawl figure among those early goers.
The Foster, which honors the fabled songwriter who penned “My Old Kentucky Home” and other 19th-century standards, is the 11th of 12 races and the last of seven stakes on a Saturday card that starts at 12:45 p.m. Eastern. The Foster goes at 5:59 and will be a primary focus of a day-long broadcast on Fox Sports 2.
Foremost among the undercard stakes is the Grade 2 Fleur de Lis (race 5, 2:45), a Win and You’re In toward the BC Distaff.
The Saturday forecast calls for mostly sunny skies and a high of 91. A forceout of all wagering pools, including the Derby City 6 (races 7-12), is in effect because of the 38-day meet ending. Ellis Park in western Kentucky starts its summer meet Sunday.