Three comebackers take on older rivals in feature

ELMONT, N.Y. – Superfecto tops a trio of 3-year-olds coming off varying degrees of layoffs looking to get a jump-start on their future when they run in a first-level allowance race Friday at Belmont Park. The 1 1/16-mile race drew a field of 10.

Superfecto has not run since May. Cost Basis has been away since February. Edge of Fire hasn’t started since July.

Superfecto, a son of Constitution trained by Ralph Nicks, won a 1 1/16-mile maiden race at Gulfstream Park on May 2. He was hustled to the front by Emisael Jaramillo and never threatened. That race followed a sixth-place finish in his debut, where Superfecto got squeezed at the start and then made a strong mid-race move before flattening out.

Nicks would have liked to have gone on to bigger and better races with Superfecto, but the horse was having trouble with the heat. Nicks first sent him to Fair Hill, a training center in Maryland, but when it got too hot there, he moved him to Saratoga.

“At Saratoga he started turning the corner slowly,” said Nicks, who has kept the horse with trainer Mark Hennig. “After a month, he was able to do some light training with him there, and towards the end of the meet he was able to get in a regular routine.”

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Superfecto shows five works at Belmont, including a bullet half-mile from the gate on Oct. 18 followed by a sharp three-furlong blowout on Oct. 25.

“His breezes have been very nice,” Nicks said. “I talk to Mark a couple of times a week, and the breezes I’ve seen on video, he seems to be doing everything right.”

There is a likelihood of a wet track on Friday. Superfecto’s second dam, Society Selection, won the Grade 1 Alabama and Grade 1 Test over wet tracks.

“I think he’ll be fine,” said Nicks, who has Luis Saez to ride from the outside post. “I don’t think it’ll bother him too much.”

Cost Basis, a son of Into Mischief trained by Chad Brown, won a one-turn mile maiden race at Aqueduct in December that produced four next-out winners. Cost Basis has run only once since, finishing fourth in a Feb. 22 allowance race.

Edge of Fire, a son of Curlin trained by Jimmy Jerkens, won his debut on Feb. 1 at Gulfstream Park. He has gone winless in three tries in this condition and has not run since a fourth-place finish here in July.

The 3-year-olds will have to take on several more-experienced opponents, including Foolish Ghost, a 5-year-old gelding who has won three of his last four starts, the last one his first off a Ray Handal claim.

“He ran how I thought he would and he bounced out of it in good shape,” Handal said. “He loves Belmont and he’s in good form. I don’t know that seven is his best distance.”

Handal said he would likely scratch his other entrant Binkster if the track is wet.

The Sicarii, a 4-year-old gelding, is coming off a win in the mud in a $32,000 claiming race going six furlongs here on Oct. 17.

Chowda, Wild Medagliad’oro, Al Brown, and Speightful Kitten complete the field.