Waralo, Jean Valjean set to throw down up front in Belmont Turf Sprint
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ELMONT, N.Y. – Racing, at its core, has always been a quest to find the fastest horse.
Thursday’s Grade 3, $200,000 Belmont Turf Sprint, scheduled for six furlongs on the inner turf, pits speedballs Waralo and Jean Valjean against each other in a battle of 7-year-olds who have combined to win 21 of 50 career starts, 11 of 19 on turf.
Trainer Chris Englehart believes Waralo could have one more win, as he thinks he ran the best horse in the Grade 2 Troy at Saratoga on Aug. 9, a race in which Waralo was beaten a head by John the Beer Man, but was questionably disqualified from second and placed third for a bumping incident in deep stretch.
The stewards deemed Waralo caused the bumping. Englehart believes it was third-lace finisher Doncho, who initiated contact that led to whatever miscue Waralo made when he finished second.
Englehart said jockey Jose Lezcano told him that when Doncho, ridden by Ricardo Santana Jr., bumped him from behind, it knocked Waralo’s back end out from under him and made the horse face in.
According to Englehart, Lezcano said, “When he was coming down to the wire, I had to check him and grab the outside rein or I’m going to drop Ricardo.”
Englehart said that the effort in the Troy did take something out of Waralo, which is why he kept him out of the Disco Partner Stakes at Saratoga on Sept. 6. Englehart last week had expressed concern about how Waralo would handle soft turf, which may have been the case had the race been run as scheduled on Sunday before being postponed. Now, he’s hoping the turf course firms up enough under dry and warm conditions Tuesday and Wednesday.
“He might like to hear his feet rattle,” Englehart said.
Englehart believes Waralo could sit off another horse, which he might have a better chance to do breaking from post 6 than he would have from the rail, where he was originally drawn. Still, it’s unlikely Lezcano is going to take Waralo’s speed away from him should he break cleanly.
Jean Valjean, trained by Elizabeth Merryman, won the Disco Partner after getting headed in the stretch.
“That was great, the way he got headed and came back on. He got mad,” Merryman said. “Johnny [Velazquez on runner-up Determined Kingdom] bumped him trying to finish him off, it reinvigorated him.”
Jean Valjean drew post 10 on the re-draw of this race, but Merryman is just happy to be outside of Waralo, giving jockey Jaime Torres some options on how to navigate the race. Though he’s only made one start at six furlongs on turf, Jean Valjean ran extremely well in the 2024 Aqueduct Turf Sprint, beaten a head by Alogon and Works for Me, who dead-heated for first.
Should both Waralo and Jean Valjean duel each other early, the race could set up nicely for Twenty Six Black, who finished a disappointing fourth in the Troy. He did win the Harvey Pack a month earlier with a career-best 101 Beyer Speed Figure, so perhaps he bounced a little in the Troy.
Trainer Ned Allard entered both Alogon and Card Trick, the first-and fifth-place finishers from the Laurel Dash on Aug. 12. Alogon won the Belmont Turf Sprint when it was held at Aqueduct in September of 2025 in addition to his dead-heat win in the 2024 Aqueduct Turf Sprint.
The Belmont Turf Sprint did pick up three horses who were not originally entered when the race was scheduled for Sunday. Spiced Up, a second-level allowance winner on Sept. 4; Creditworthy, third behind Jean Valjean in the Disco Partner; and Chasing Liberty, fourth behind Twenty Six Black in in the Harvey Pack before running poorly in an allowance at Kentucky Downs, all entered for Thursday.
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