Mind Your Biscuits makes 4-year-old debut in Gulfstream Sprint

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – By the end of 2016, Mind Your Biscuits had established himself as one of the premier sprinters in the country, 3-year-old or otherwise. And new trainer Chad Summers expects even better from him at 4, a campaign that begins Saturday when he meets five rivals, including the highly regarded Unified, in the Grade 3, $100,000 Gulfstream Park Sprint.

Mind Your Biscuits, who won his maiden against New York-breds last spring, capped his 3-year-old campaign with a third-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint and a half-length decision over Sharp Azteca in the Grade 1 Malibu. Mind Your Biscuits was trained throughout his 3-year-old season by Robert Falcone Jr. but is now under the guidance of Summers, who has been around the son of Posse from the beginning before finally taking out his trainer’s license this winter.

Summers attributes Mind Your Biscuits’s startling improvement during the second half of 2016 to maturity and the addition of blinkers, an equipment change made prior to his nine-length New York-bred allowance victory July 4 at Belmont Park.

“He breezed in blinkers at the breeze show and trained in blinkers on the farm, and we always knew he’d be a blinker horse, but I don’t like putting blinkers on a horse too early,” Summers said.

Summers said he gave Mind Your Biscuits a “nice little break” after he returned from Santa Anita following his victory in the Malibu, for which he earned a career-best 107 Beyer Speed Figure. He has had three works at Palm Meadows while preparing for his return, including a 47.60-second half-mile on Feb. 10.

“We gave him one serious work a couple of weeks ago, and I expect a big race from him, although he’s probably about 90 percent ready to go, not 100 percent,” Summers said.

Summers said he believes the Malibu was clearly Mind Your Biscuits’s most impressive effort at 3.

“Knowing the horse Sharp Azteca is, I think the Malibu was definitely his best race so far,” Summers said. “But I believe he’s capable of running even better this year.”

Mind Your Biscuits will break from the outside in post 6 under regular rider Joel Rosario.

“I couldn’t be happier with the draw,” Summers said. “He’s been stuck on the rail in each of his last three starts. Now he gets the outside, with what I believe to be our chief competition, Unified, on the rail, which might force his hand a little, especially with Delta Bluesman breaking right next to him.”

Unified has been idle since suffering his only setback in four starts when finishing fifth as the prohibitive favorite in the Grade 3 Pegasus last June at Monmouth Park. Unified was an eye-catching maiden winner in his career debut here last winter before winning the Grade 3 Bay Shore and Grade 2 Peter Pan in his next two starts.

“We couldn’t pin it down to one specific thing,” trainer Jimmy Jerkens said of Unified’s poor showing in the Pegasus. “He had done a lot in a short time. We asked the impossible, and he gave it to us, and I think it just got to him a little bit.”

Unified has also been preparing for his return at Palm Meadows, where he’s posted three black-letter works since Jan. 14.

“He’s had plenty of works, and his last two or three, he’s really put it together,” Jerkens said.

Early Entry, who is perfect in four starts at Gulfstream Park, returned from an 11-month layoff to upset Delta Bluesman in the Sunshine Millions Sprint. They will be rematched in the Gulfstream Sprint, with Grade 3 winner Squadron A and Divine Warrior completing the lineup.