ELMONT, N.Y. – Linda Rice is on the verge of winning her first outright trainer’s title at Belmont Park. Entering the final three days of the meet, Rice holds a 31-26 lead over Chad Brown, who has won the last seven Belmont spring meet titles. Over the final three days of the meet, Rice has runners entered in 18 of the 31 races carded while Brown has runners in eight. It would be the fourth consecutive meet title for Rice on the New York Racing Association circuit. She won the 2022 Aqueduct fall meet, and the 2023 Aqueduct winter and spring meets. “Winning any training title is nice but to cap off a good fall and winter with a win in the Belmont spring meet would certainly be a lot of fun,” Rice said. In 2011, Rice tied Todd Pletcher for most wins at a Belmont fall meet. Of course, in 2009, Rice became the first female trainer to win a Saratoga title. Frustrated with her inability to buy horses at 2-year-old sales, Rice has put a stronger concentration on claiming horses. While she’s been very active in New York, she also has expanded her reach to Kentucky. :: Get Belmont Park Clocker Reports from Mike Welsch and the Clocker Team. Available every race day. In the fall of 2021, Rice began claiming horses out of Kentucky tracks and bringing them to New York. Her first venture was largely unsuccessful as in the fall of 2021, between Keeneland and Churchill Downs, she claimed 15 horses for a total of $677,500. Those horses won just four of 30 starts and earned $175,917. Eight of those horses were claimed away from her for a total of $153,000. “My first venture in it was not great. It was a bit of struggle,” Rice said. “Horses weren’t running up to par and I decided to try it again.” In the fall of 2022, Rice claimed four horses at Churchill for a total of $170,000. That quartet has combined to win eight races from 21 starts and earn $515,935. The group includes Joey Freshwater, a $50,000 claimer who won the Grade 3 Bay Shore at Aqueduct in April and has earned $204,650, and Tonal Impact, taken for $40,000, who has won 3 of 8 starts and $250,460. Tonal Impact is entered in Saturday’s Grade 2, $350,000 Suburban at Belmont. This year, between Keeneland, Churchill, and Ellis Park, Rice has already claimed 23 horses totaling $1,097,500. So far, Rice has won three races from 14 starters with that group for earnings of $237,966. Fifteen horses have yet to run back. “New stock and also I feel like maybe you can claim a little stronger pedigrees in Kentucky,” Rice said when asked why she has turned to Kentucky to claim. “A lot of breeders have horses they didn’t sell and things like that.” Rice made many of those claims with herself as the owner. Rice said if the horse she claimed had run well, she gets many calls from owners wanting to join in, though there is a 30-day mandatory waiting period after the claim before a horse can be transferred to another owner. “If I claim a horse and win a shake and he runs horrible nobody’s calling me and then I have to figure out how to bail myself out of that,” Rice said. When Rice heads to Saratoga next week, she will not do so thinking she can win another trainer’s title, figuring that will come down, as usual, to Chad Brown and Todd Pletcher. She is just hoping to improve on the 14-win meet she had a year ago. But Rice also heads to Saratoga without the black cloud of a three-year suspension issued by the New York State Gaming Commission hanging over head. Last month, a New York appeals court ruled the penalty Rice received for getting confidential information about races before they were drawn over a decade ago was “shockingly unfair” and recommended it be thrown out. “It was certainly a relief to get a positive response from the appeals court and that they saw things the way we thought they were,” Rice said. ◗ The Grade 1, $600,000 Saratoga Derby Invitational winner will get an automatic berth into the Group 1 Cox Plate in Australia, it was announced Wednesday. The Cox Plate this year will be held Oct. 28 at Moonee Valley. In 2021, the Joseph O’Brien-trained State of Rest won the Saratoga Derby and later that year won the Cox Plate. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.