Pressure on Firenze Fire for top-three Wood Memorial finish

The easy path to the Kentucky Derby has not been so easy after all for Firenze Fire.

Firenze Fire’s connections, owner Ron Lombardi and trainer Jason Servis, left Firenze Fire in New York all winter because they felt it was the path of least resistance to the Kentucky Derby, Lombardi’s stated goal following the colt’s successful 2-year-old season.

After winning the Jerome at Aqueduct on Jan. 11, Firenze Fire finished second there in the Grade 3 Withers and fourth in the Grade 3 Gotham. Now, Firenze Fire likely needs a top-three finish in Saturday’s Grade 2 Wood Memorial at Aqueduct to ensure a spot in the Churchill Downs starting gate on May 5.

Competing in all four of Aqueduct’s races for 3-year-olds wasn’t necessarily trainer Jason Servis’s initial plan.

“I think we’ve done all we could to try and get our points without really setting him back,” Servis said Sunday in his office at the Palm Meadows training center in Florida. “We had him run as effectively as we could while leaning on him a little bit. I maybe would have skipped a race.”

Firenze Fire, who won the Grade 1 Champagne last year, has 29 qualifying points under the system Churchill Downs uses to determine the Derby field in the likely event the race draws a full complement of 20. Points appear to be at a premium this year, especially with one slot reserved for a European-based runner and another reserved for a Japanese-based colt.

A top-three finish in the Wood – which offers 100-40-20-10 points to its top four finishers – would be enough for Firenze Fire to make the cut. A fourth-place finish could also work depending on what happens in other prep races around the country.

Firenze Fire has yet to prove he can be effective going 1 1/8 miles or beyond. In the Withers, at 1 1/8 miles, Firenze Fire was a bit rank early and that took something away from his closing kick as he finished second to Avery Island. The Withers was run three weeks after the Jerome.

“Him being a little rank may have something to do with running him back quick,” Servis said.

Five weeks later, however, Firenze Fire was a bit eager in the Gotham as well and finished fourth in the one-turn mile.

Servis is hopeful that on Saturday jockey Manny Franco can get Firenze Fire to relax early and come with a late run, similar to how he won the Jerome.

Firenze Fire’s presence in the Wood could be good news for his competitors in that he’s a Grade 1 winner, which means the purse will increase from $750,000 to $1 million under an incentive announced earlier this year by the New York Racing Association.

As of Monday, the Wood field remained in flux. An injury to McKinzie, who was scheduled to run in Saturday’s Santa Anita Derby, has trainer Bob Baffert shuffling plans for his 3-year-olds. That includes Solomini, who was scheduled to run in the Wood but who is also being considered for the Grade 1 Arkansas Derby at Oaklawn on April 14. If Solomini goes to Arkansas, Baffert is likely to run recent maiden winner Restored Hope in the Wood.

Trainer Todd Pletcher said he is considering splitting up his 3-year-olds, meaning he would run Vino Rosso in the Wood and Marconi possibly in Saturday’s Blue Grass at Keeneland.

Enticed, the Grade 3 Gotham winner trained by Kiaran McLaughlin, will likely be the favorite in the Wood. Also expected to enter the Wood on Wednesday is On Time Revival, second in the Gotham; King Zachary, a good-looking maiden winner at Gulfstream; and Evaluator, who hasn’t run since a nose loss in the Damon Runyon Stakes at Aqueduct on Jan. 15. American Lincoln, a recent 18 3/4-length maiden winner of a slow 1 1/8-mile maiden race, is also possible.

– additional reporting by Jay Privman