Thursday TimeformUS Highlight Horse: Viggiedal ready for stakes test in Schuylerville

Saratoga | Race 10 | Post Time 6:16 p.m. (ET)

The top two finishers from the Astoria are back in the Schuylerville, Saratoga’s traditional opening-day feature. However, the waters get much deeper for both Whatintheliteral (#8) and Aoraki (#1). The former used her experience as an advantage to upset the Astoria last month, getting to the lead and gamely fending off her rival. Yet she lacks the upside of some others in this field, and almost surely has to run faster to beat this group. Aoraki is a little more appealing, since she has worked well since that race, going slightly better in company with Sanford contender Three Echoes in her most recent drill. However, I still prefer a few of the recent debut winners.

Complexion (#5) could attract the most support among those. The half-sister to Jack Christopher looks like a miniature version of her Grade 1-winning sibling. She showed excellent early speed to overcome a slight stumble at the start of her debut, winning in gate-to-wire fashion. However, she did get away with some pretty soft fractions that day, setting a slow pace before sprinting home. She obviously has talent, but I’m worried about her dealing with a more competitive pace scenario here.

Sherbini (#3) and Carmen’s Candy Jar (#6) are appealing for the sheer fact they showed the ability to pass horses in their respective debuts. Sherbini is a shorter price on my morning line, but may drift up from there. She didn’t attract that much support on debut but nevertheless ran a professional race, closing from fourth to win going away. That was an auction-restricted maiden, but her 97 TimeformUS Speed Figure is one of the fastest numbers in this field. Carmen’s Candy Jar also showed favorable attributes on debut, rating in a pocket before splitting horses in the stretch. She has to run faster while also returning on just 18 days’ rest.

My top pick is Churchill debut winner Viggiedal (#10). Like Complexion, she didn’t have to set particularly fast fractions on the front end, but the speed she showed appeared to come very easily to her. She traveled well to upper stretch and then found another gear when asked for run, flying through her last eighth in 11.82 seconds before galloping out with excellent energy. I like that she’s drawn outside of her main pace rivals, so she figures to get an outside pressing trip, as depicted on the TimeformUS Pace Projector. This daughter of hot freshman sire Vekoma has good length to her stride for such a young 2-year-old, so I don’t foresee her having an issue with the added distance.