Royal Urn among stars of New Jersey Thoroughbred Festival stakes

Royal Urn has had a productive summer at Monmouth Park and will attempt to nail down his second stakes win of the meet Sunday during the track’s New Jersey Thoroughbred Festival.

He goes in the $100,000 New Jersey Breeders’ Handicap, which is one of three stakes on a card of 10 races. The entire program is restricted to horses bred in the state, and total purses top $700,000, with the stakes worth a cumulative $325,000.

Royal Urn will be cutting back from a two-turn mile to one turn for the New Jersey Breeders’ Handicap and is both the 123-pound highweight and probable favorite for the six furlong race for 3-year-olds and up. The last time he ran at the distance he won the $80,000 John J. Reilly on July 5 at Monmouth.

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The Reilly was Royal Urn’s first for Kelly Breen, who is the leading trainer at the Monmouth meet, and first in a stakes.

“He’s a nice New Jersey-bred,” Breen said Friday. “We’re just getting to know him and everything about him. He’s a good-looking horse, a copper-penny chestnut.”

Royal Urn closed with a rush to capture the Reilly by 2 1/4 and was flattered when two runners he defeated returned to win their next start, including Golden Brown. Golden Brown is the probable favorite in the $125,000 Charles Hesse III Handicap, which goes earlier on the card Sunday.

Royal Urn moved on from the Reilly to the $75,000 Irish War Cry for New Jersey-breds on July 25 at Monmouth and was prominent in the mile race when finishing second. Breen is happy for the opportunity move him back to one turn Sunday.

“He’ll come closing,” he said. “He’ll sit off the pace and make one run.

“Maybe his best race is as a closing sprinter, and that’s where we’re at.”

Joe Bravo has the mount on Royal Urn, a son of Kantharos, for breeder Roseland Farm Stable.

Royal Urn is part of a field of seven that includes two past winners of the New Jersey Breeders’ Handicap, Chublicious and Amatteroftime. Also in the field are stakes winners Regally Irish and Brother Chub, who is a full brother to Chublicious.

The stakes action starts with the Hesse, which is for 3-year-olds and up at 1 1/16 miles. The field of six is led by Golden Brown, who won the Irish War Cry by 2 1/4 lengths. He won the Hesse last year, one of three New Jersey-bred stakes victories he had in 2019.

“I think against Jersey-breds going long on the dirt, with Sunny Ridge on the sidelines, he is at the top of the heap,” trainer Patrick McBurney told publicity at Monmouth. “His starts have been spaced out a little more than usual, but I thought we’d take advantage of more Jersey racing with him this year.”

Paco Lopez has the mount on Golden Brown, a son of Offlee Wild.

Liz’s Cable Girl is the 124-pound highweight in the $100,000 Eleven North Handicap, a six furlong race for fillies and mares. She won this race in 2018 and was second in last year’s renewal. The start Sunday will be her second off a layoff.

Liz’s Cable Girl could get a tracking trip off Prancing Warrior, who has a chance to control the pace Sunday.