Owner convinced Wise Dan's in the right spot

There is only one horse pointed to a 2014 Breeders’ Cup race who is going for a BC three-peat, and that, of course, is Wise Dan.

Wise Dan won the Mile in 2012 by 1 1/2 lengths over Animal Kingdom, and he won it last year – overcoming early trouble and the loss of regular rider John Velazquez to injury earlier in the day – by three-quarters of a length over Za Approval.

As usual, there is clamoring from some quarters for Wise Dan to try the Classic, not the Mile, to step outside his preferred distance and surface and prove that his greatness flows beyond his comfort zone. Trainer Charlie LoPresti regularly raves about the way Wise Dan works on dirt tracks. The last two times Wise Dan raced on dirt, he won the Grade 1 Clark Handicap at nine furlongs and finished second in the Stephen Foster at the same distance.

But Morton Fink still wants no part of the Classic. Fink, Wise Dan’s owner and breeder, turns 85 in December. He has 40 years in the horse business, and strong opinions about placing horses where they best belong.

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“In my mind, the Classic is out, but I think Charlie thinks he would have a shot,” said Fink, reached by phone at his suburban Chicago home Monday afternoon. “It’s logical to run him in a race where he should win. Is this a good time, really, to see if he wants a mile and a quarter on the dirt?”

Wise Dan is only one race into a comeback from colic surgery. The 7-year-old gelding colicked in mid-May, undergoing emergency surgery May 16. The term colic in horses really only describes a stomach ache, but horse stomachs are tricky. If intestines get fully clogged or twisted, very bad things can happen, but Wise Dan got lucky: His intestine only had looped over itself, and surgeons simply flipped it back into place and sewed the two-time Horse of the Year back up.

Three and a half months later, Wise Dan returned to action in the Bernard Baruch Handicap at Saratoga. A nose victory over Optimizer, a horse Wise Dan had drummed in the past, suggested to some that Wise Dan could be in some stage of decline, and who knows, after 30 starts and four trips to the Breeders’ Cup (he was sixth in the 2011 Sprint) maybe Wise Dan has lost a step. But keep in mind Wise Dan carried 11 pounds more than Optimizer in the Baruch, was making his first start after going under the knife, and never appeared to fully relax while probably short of peak fitness.

Still, he won for the 13th straight time on turf, and in the Oct. 4 Shadwell Turf Mile, Wise Dan can avenge the only loss he has taken the last 27 months, a second-place finish to Silver Max last fall at Keeneland when the Shadwell was rained off the turf onto the synthetic Polytrack.

The Shadwell is very much the key prep race for the BC Mile, including not only Wise Dan and Silver Max, but Seek Again and Kaigun. The 4-year-old Seek Again seems like he is the North American horse with the best chance to dethrone Wise Dan, with a narrow defeat to Wise Dan in May, and an impressive last-out score in the Fourstardave at one mile at Saratoga. Kaigun ran second to Wise Dan this past spring at Keeneland in the Marker’s 46 Mile, and exits a second-place finish in the Sept. 14 Woodbine Mile.

The Woodbine Mile winner Trade Storm, based in England, is an intended runner in the Mile, but the overseas contingent might not prove especially strong. Kingman, the best European miler, had been mentioned for the Mile but was retired last week, and with Kingman out of the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes next month at Ascot, Toronado probably starts there and not in the BC Mile. The French horse Anodin could come to Santa Anita, as could the Ireland-based mare Fiesolana, who did not win a Group 1 race until her 21st start.

The local Mile prep, the Oct. 4 City of Hope Mile at Santa Anita, could attract California’s top two turf milers, Obviously and Tom’s Tribute. Obviously finished third in the 2012 Mile and fifth in the race last year.