Tonalist has options for 2016 campaign

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – The mass exodus of this circuit’s top horses and horsemen was well under way Sunday and Monday as planes, vans, and automobiles were being loaded and directed south for the winter.

The good news is many of those same horses – and horsemen – will be headed back here in a few months, including Tonalist, Saturday’s Grade 1 Cigar Mile winner who will have a 5-year-old campaign in 2016.

First, however, Tonalist will get at least 30 days off at Payson Park in Florida, where he and stablemate Red Vine, the Cigar Mile runner-up, were to arrive Tuesday following a van ride Monday from Belmont Park. Tonalist ran a final quarter in 23.23 seconds to overcome a pedestrian pace and outfinish Red Vine and win the Cigar Mile by a neck. Tonalist now is a Grade 1 winner at a mile, 1 1/4 miles, and 1 1/2 miles, having won the last two runnings of the Jockey Club Gold Cup, as well as the 2014 Belmont Stakes. Earlier in the year, he won the Grade 3 Westchester and finished second in the Met Mile, both one-mile races at Belmont.

“All our Kentucky friends kept telling me all year long that he was not a miler, [that] he was a mile-and-a-half, plodding horse,” said trainer Christophe Clement. “I kept telling them the race in the Met Mile was a very good race. The Westchester was a very good race. He’s not a plodder. He’s just a top-class horse at a mile to a mile and a half.”

Clement said Tonalist would get December off, either just tack-walking or jogging in the morning while being turned out in the afternoon. Tonalist could resume training in time to make the Donn Handicap at Gulfstream Park on Feb. 6, which would be a stepping-stone to the $10 million Dubai World Cup on March 26, or Tonalist simply could wait until May and start his campaign in the Grade 3 Westchester as he did in 2015.

“If he’s doing well and I can do it, we’ll do the Donn and the Dubai World Cup,” said Clement. “If I think he needs more time, I’ll come back here. I don’t want to even think about it. I just want to worry about his well-being at the moment.”

Clement said his goal for Red Vine in 2016 is to make him a Grade 1 winner.

“He really deserves it,” said Clement. “Let’s keep him sound. He ran a superb race.”

Matrooh and Mshawish, the third- and fourth-place finishers out of the Cigar Mile, also are headed to south Florida. Trainer Chad Brown said Matrooh could target the Grade 2, $500,000 Gulfstream Park Handicap on March 5 as a prep for the Grade 1 Carter at Aqueduct on April 9.

Mshawish, trained by Todd Pletcher, was beaten only 1 1/4 lengths in his dirt debut in the Cigar Mile. He is a Grade 1 winner on turf, so his options are plentiful.

Private Zone, who finished fifth as the favorite in the Cigar Mile, flew back to south Florida on Sunday. Trainer Brian Lynch said the horse was examined before he left, and there were no indications of a physical issue.

Lynch said the horse would get a break, and he also could be a candidate for the Gulfstream Park Handicap in March.