Street Fight has class edge in steeplechase optional claimer

The first stop on the National Steeplechase Association’s Summer Jump-Racing Showcase is Monmouth Park, where three hurdle races are part of Friday’s program.

A pair of maiden races worth $30,000 apiece and a first-level optional $25,000 claimer with a $35,000 purse will go as races 1, 2, and 5. All three races for jumpers will be contested at 2 1/4 miles over National Fences, constructed of a steel frame stuffed with plastic “brush.”

During the summer tour, purses will total about $1.5 million, with racing at Saratoga, Suffolk Downs, and Kentucky Downs.

The fifth race drew a field of 10, led by the 6-year-old gelding Street Fight. Trained by Arch Kingsley for Cot Campbell’s Dogwood Stable, Street Fight has finished second in each of the last two runnings of the Grade 3 Imperial Cup at Aiken, S.C. He most recently finished third in the Queen’s Cup MPC Steeplechase for novices April 25 in Charlotte, N.C.

Jack Fisher, the eight-time leading steeplechase trainer in the U.S. and sitting atop the standings again through the spring events with 12 victories, will send out the uncoupled entry of Hot Sand and Iron Works.

Hot Sand won his first start over fences April 18 at the Atlanta Steeplechase. He will be ridden by four-time champion jockey Paddy Young, the leading steeplechase jockey in 2015 with 12 wins.

Iron Works, a maiden winner March 28 at the Carolina Cup in Camden, S.C., was pulled up late in the Marcellus Frost Novice Stakes at the Iroquois Steeplechase in Nashville, Tenn., on May 9.

The field also includes So Outspoken, who has two wins this season, including a $25,000 handicap in Atlanta in mid-April. He is trained by Jazz Napravnik, the sister of recently retired star rider Rosie Napravnik.

Richard Valentine, the trainer of 2014 Eclipse Award winner Demonstrative, has a pair of entrants. Leather Gloves and Umbraggio were maiden winners in 2014. Leather Gloves will be making his first start in nearly 11 months, while Umbraggio has been off since winning his maiden at Far Hills, N.J., last October.

◗ Among the intriguing maidens running in race 1 is the 6-year-old North Star Boy, fourth on the flat in the Henry Clark Stakes at Pimlico in April and beaten just 2 1/4 lengths by Wise Dan in last summer’s Grade 2 Bernard Baruch at Saratoga.