Post Time looks to break through in loaded Cigar

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Post Time began his 4-year-old campaign in January running fast, winning a restricted stakes in Maryland. He has spent the rest of the year running consistently well and frequently fast, if not always fast enough, in some of the most prestigious races in the country.

Placed in all three of his Grade 1 attempts this year, Post Time looks to cap a terrific campaign with a victory in Saturday’s Grade 2, $500,000 Cigar Mile at Aqueduct. A race that somehow lost Grade 1 status beginning in 2023, this year’s renewal drew a field of 11 – including four Grade 1 winners – who have combined to win 34 stakes, 13 of which were graded.

Four times in the last 10 runnings, the Cigar Mile has been won by a horse coming out of a Breeders’ Cup race. Last year, Breeders’ Cup alums Hoist the Gold, sixth in the BC Sprint, and Senor Buscador, seventh in the Classic, finished first and second in the Cigar Mile.

Post Time, second in the BC Dirt Mile last month; Mullikin, third as the favorite in the BC Sprint; and Senor Buscador, fifth in the BC Classic, are part of this year’s Cigar Mile field.

Post Time, who earlier this year ran second in the Metropolitan Handicap and third in the Whitney – both Grade 1 stakes at Saratoga – rallied from last of 13 to finish second, 1 1/2 lengths behind Full Serrano in the Dirt Mile at Del Mar.

“He showed up, that’s what he’s done all along, that gave us the confidence to go,” trainer Brittany Russell said. “He continued to do what we ask him to do. I’m hoping one of these days he can get one of these bigger ones. He deserves it.”

Russell said the Cigar Mile was in the back of her mind after the Breeders’ Cup, dependent on what the horse was showing her out of the race.

“We’re really happy with him. I think he’s training just as good as he ever has,” Russell said.

Post Time has already been successful at Aqueduct, winning the Grade 2 Carter in April. On Saturday, Post Time breaks from post 11 under Sheldon Russell.

Mullikin won the Grade 2 John Nerud here in July and followed that up with a Grade 1 victory in the Forego at Saratoga, his fourth consecutive victory. Resenting kickback early in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint, Mullikin was farther back than originally planned. Saturday will be his first try at a mile.

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“We didn’t get the trip we were hoping,” trainer Rodolphe Brisset said. “It’s nobody’s fault, it’s the way it set up, we turn the page and move on. I really think the mile won’t be an issue, even more it’s a one-turn mile.”

Flavien Prat rides Mullikin from post 5. Prat enters Saturday with 53 graded stakes wins in 2024, two shy of Jerry Bailey’s single-year record of 55 set in 2003. Prat’s 78 stakes wins are one shy of Irad Ortiz Jr.’s single-year record of 79 set in 2022.

Senor Buscador finished seventh in last year’s BC Classic and then shortened up in the Cigar Mile, where he finished second behind Hoist the Gold. Senor Buscador went on to finish second in the Pegasus World Cup at Gulfstream Park and win the $20 million Saudi Cup, a one-turn race run at 1 1/8 miles. After a lengthy layoff following a third in the Dubai World Cup, Senor Buscador has run three times, most recently a fifth behind Sierra Leone in the Classic.

“I thought he ran really good,” said trainer Todd Fincher. “He was stuck down on the rail, didn’t ever get into a rhythm. He kept trying to keep his position down there and not get shut off. [The mile] is a little short for him, but he can handle a mile, he ran great there last year . . . . Hopefully, he’ll repeat and run just as good and maybe get a better trip.”

Joel Rosario rides Senor Buscador from post 9.

In the 35 previous runnings of the Cigar Mile, a 3-year-old has won 12 of them, most recently Americanrevolution in 2021. Americanrevolution was trained by Todd Pletcher, who has won this race a record six times and who Saturday will send out Locked for just his second start of the year.

A Grade 1 winner at 2, Locked was sidelined in the winter due to a knee injury. In his only start this year, Locked won a seven-furlong allowance by 7 1/2 lengths at Aqueduct. Two horses from that race, Quality Chic and Costa Terra, came back to win their next starts.

In that allowance win, Locked “showed good tactical speed,” Pletcher said. “It seemed like a pretty fastly run race [1:21.02]. Off the strength of that race going seven-eighths at Aqueduct, the Cigar Mile seemed to make sense.”

The 3-year-old who could challenge for favoritism in the Cigar Mile is Book’em Danno, winner of the Grade 1 Woody Stephens at Saratoga in June. Book’em Danno is coming off a narrow defeat at 3-5 in the Grade 3 Perryville at Keeneland, a race in which he encountered some traffic in the stretch under Irad Ortiz Jr. and was beaten a neck by 28-1 Brunacini.

“He had quite a bit of traffic,” said Derek Ryan, the trainer of Book’em Danno. “I’m a little biased but I felt he should have won the race. He got blocked when he needed to be clear. If he gets through, it’s a great ride, if you don’t get through it’s ‘What are you doing?’ ”

The last time Book’em Danno ran a mile, he was beaten a head by Forever Young in the Saudi Derby. Ortiz rides Book’em Danno from the rail.

Coastal Mission, the multiple stakes-winning West Virginia-bred, broke through with the first graded stakes win of his career in the Grade 3 Forty Niner here on Oct. 26. Nelson Avenue and Repo Rocks, the second- and fourth-place finishers from that race, are back in the Cigar field.

Law Professor, who is 5 for 7 with two stakes wins at Aqueduct, came off a near six-month layoff to win by a nose going 1 1/8 miles here on Oct. 25. Pipeline comes off a solid allowance win at Keeneland. Vinsanity looks ambitiously placed.

The Cigar Mile goes as race 9 on a 10-race card that begins at 11:40 a.m. and includes the Grade 2 Remsen, Grade 2 Demoiselle, and Grade 3 Go for Wand.

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