Mr. Jagermeister in top form for Minnesota Sprint Championship

There’s a homegrown rock star making an appearance at Canterbury Park on Sunday – and he’s got four legs.

Mr. Jagermeister is back racing in his home state in the $100,000 Minnesota Sprint Championship. The stakes is one of eight on the card. Each is restricted to Minnesota-breds, with the six stakes for Thoroughbreds worth a total of $600,000.

The Sprint, for 3-year-olds and up at six furlongs, will mark Mr. Jagermeister’s first appearance at the meet and he enters in peak form. He’s won his last two starts, beginning with an April allowance at Oaklawn. Mr. Jagermeister then captured the $100,000 Chesapeake on Aug. 17 at Colonial Downs, where he set a pressured pace and went on to a 1 3/4-length win while covering six furlongs in 1:09.69. He earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 97.

“That was a really good group of older males that have done a lot of things, that have proven themselves,” trainer Valorie Lund said. “He really looked awesome in that race.”

Mr. Jagermeister now returns to the Minnesota-bred stakes ranks, where he is 5 for 5. His Minnesota-bred stakes streak started with a 15 1/2-length victory in the 2017 running of Northern Lights Futurity at Canterbury. He added four more statebred stakes wins at the track last year to be crowned 3-year-old of the year by the Minnesota Thoroughbred Association.

Mr. Jagermeister, 4, is a son of Atta Boy Roy, a Grade 2 winner Lund selected as a yearling at auction and trained. Mr. Jagermeister’s dam is the winning mare Frangelica, whom Lund and her sister Kristin Boice bought as a yearling. Boice is the breeder of Mr. Jagermeister and owns him with Lund and Leslie Cummings.

“I think he’s an improving young horse,” Lund said. “We had him pegged early on as a late bloomer, as was his sire, and we tried to be patient and conservative with him his 2- and 3-year-old year. We thought this could be a really stellar year for him. I think we’ll see another step forward in this next race.”

Mr. Jagermeister will break from the rail under Leandro Goncalves in a field of seven.

“I prefer the outside, just because you’re kind of committed to going if you’re down inside,” Lund said.

Among his opponents is Mister Banjoman, impressive winner of last month’s $100,000 Minnesota Derby.

Hot Shot Kid, who was the top older male Minnesota-bred of 2018, seeks to continue his outstanding Canterbury meet in the $100,000 Classic Championship. The race is for 3-year-olds and up at 1 1/16 miles and the field of seven also includes Fireman Oscar, a fast-closing second in last month’s Blair’s Cove at Canterbury.

Hot Shot Kid won that race – his fourth win at the meet from five starts. Three of the wins have come in stakes. Hot Shot Kid races for Warren L. Bush. He will break from post 3, with Orlando Mojica to ride for trainer Mac Robertson.

Robertson swept the four Thoroughbred stakes on the Made in Minnesota card last month at Canterbury. His other stakes representatives Sunday are Defend the Rose and Rental Pool in the Northern Lights Debutante for 2-year-old fillies; Happy Hour Cowboy in the Northern Lights Futurity; Ready to Runaway in the Distaff Classic Championship; and Honey’s Sox Appeal and Click Bait in the Distaff Sprint Championship.