Saratoga: Stakes horses get chance to work on turf

After overnight rains forced turf workouts to be canceled Friday, four horses prepping for upcoming stakes were granted special permission to breeze over the Oklahoma grass course Saturday. The quartet consisted of a pair from trainer Christophe Clement’s barn, Mystical Star and Right One; trainer Shug McGaughey’s Man o’ War winner Point of Entry, and Harrods Creek for trainer Bill Mott.

Mystical Star and Right One were the first to go, in company, and both looked brilliant. Right One broke outside and about a length behind his mate at the half-mile pole and eased alongside after an opening quarter in 24.20 seconds, with the pair coming down the stretch in 23 seconds to the wire before continuing out five-eighths in 58.45 and six furlongs back around to the five-furlong pole in 1:12.02. As expected, Clement was thrilled with the way both of his horses worked.

“Really nice works, they started slow and picked it up all the way,” Clement said. “They looked great. I’m very happy.

The French-bred Right One is coming off a fifth-place finish in the Grade 3 Poker. That followed a solid second-place effort behind Upgrade in defense of his title in the Grade 3 Jaipur. Mystical Star is coming off a victory in the Grade 2 New York at Belmont.

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“The Fourstardave is the most logical choice for Right One’s next start, although we have some other options as well,” Clement said. “The filly has been trained for the Beverly D. We were supposed to get on the grass yesterday but didn’t, and this work was more important than normal because they are the best colt and best filly in the barn. I asked them if we could find an alternative after the works were canceled Friday, and they allowed us to work on the grass today, which was nice.”

Point of Entry has won his last three starts, including the Grade 1 Man o’ War. He went an easy half-mile in 49.62 on Saturday in preparation for the Grade 1 Sword Dancer on Aug. 18.

“We were going to go yesterday, and they said wait and they’d let us go this morning,” McGaughey said. “I had a couple of others I wanted to work this morning, too, but they told us stakes horses only. I didn’t want to ask him for anything today. He’s doing very well, keeps on getting better, we’re right on schedule.”

Harrods Creek went five furlongs in 1:00.63 in his final prep for Friday’s John’s Call Stakes.

Turbulent Descent on target for Ballerina

Trainer Todd Pletcher also called a bit of an audible because of track conditions Saturday, switching Turbulent Descent’s work scheduled for the main track to the Oklahoma training track, where she breezed five furlongs in 1:01.40. The work was the third for the three-time Grade 1 winner since being purchased privately and transferred to Pletcher’s barn earlier this summer.

“We switched over to the training track because we thought the surface was better this morning, the main track was still too wet,” Pletcher said. “She’s doing very well. We’re on schedule or ahead of schedule for the Ballerina at the moment.”

The Grade 1 Ballerina will be run on Aug. 24.