Wild Gams tries to go distance

ELMONT, N.Y. - Wild Gams's running style suggests that she could certainly handle seven furlongs. But until she does it, she hasn't done it. She will get another chance to do it Friday when she runs in the Grade 2, $150,000 First Flight Handicap at Belmont Park.

The First Flight, at seven furlongs, shares the Fourth of July spotlight with the Grade 2, $200,000 Tom Fool Handicap for male sprinters, also at seven furlongs. First post is 3 p.m.

Wild Gams, a New Jersey-bred daughter of Forest Wildcat, has displayed a powerful late kick that has carried her to six stakes wins, all at six furlongs or shorter. She is winless in three tries at seven, though she was beaten just a neck in the Bessarbian Stakes at Woodbine last November. She made her 5-year-old debut in the seven-furlong Madison at Keeneland, where she was beaten 3 1/4 lengths by Ventura.

"It was her first start back off the layoff, she was doing well, but we kind of thought she could have used one more breeze," trainer Ben Perkins Jr. said. "That's the way she ran. Turning for home, she eased out and looked like she was starting to make her bid, but she didn't carry it through to the wire like she usually does."

Wild Gams came out of the Madison to win the My Juliet Stakes at six furlongs at Philadelphia Park.

Wild Gams will break from post 6 under Alan Garcia.

Looky Yonder - if she runs - and Rite Moment are the ones Wild Gams has to beat. Looky Yonder, trained by Richard Dutrow Jr., has won her last three starts on dirt, including a 9-1 upset in the Grade 2 Vagrancy Handicap here May 29. Her connections also are considering the Grade 1 Princess Rooney a week from Saturday at Calder, though Dutrow said he'd like to run here. Dutrow and owner Lansdon Robbins also entered the New York-bred Ice Cool Kitty, absent from the races since last November, in the First Flight

"Looky Yonder will be tough to beat if she runs," Dutrow said. "Ice Cool Kitty, every time I run her off the bench she just couldn't run worse and then she comes right back and wins. So if we run her, it's not going to disappoint me if she runs up the track. I'm going to figure that's her."

Rite Moment got a brief respite after she won 5 of 7 races over the winter and spring. She is likely a pace factor.

Akronism, Any Limit, Baroness Thatcher, and Windy complete the field.