Wise Dan works with eye toward Fourstardave

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – It wasn’t the eye-catching, stopwatch-cracking workout that we’ve become accustomed to from Wise Dan. But it wasn’t a workout that had trainer Charlie LoPresti ready to pack up his belongings and head back to Kentucky either.

Rather, Wise Dan’s five-furlong move in 1:03.65 over the Oklahoma turf course Friday at sun-splashed Saratoga was another step toward a comeback for the two-time Horse of the Year. Whether his return comes in the Grade 2, $500,000 Fourstardave Handicap here Aug. 9 – a race he’s won the last two years – the Grade 2, $250,000 Bernard Baruch Handicap here Aug. 30, or somewhere else remains uncertain.

“I really want him to run,” LoPresti said. “I brought him here to run. I’d like to win the Fourstardave again with him. He’s got to tell me. We’ll know in the next week or so.”

LoPresti was hoping to get a better signal from Wise Dan on Friday in what was the 7-year-old gelding’s third work since returning to training after undergoing colic surgery almost 10 weeks ago.

Wise Dan was the second horse on the turf course just after 9:45 a.m. and was permitted to work inside the cones, called “dogs.” Under exercise rider Damien Rock, Wise Dan went his first quarter in 26.29 seconds. Around the turn, Wise Dan appeared to take an awkward step on his way to completing three furlongs in 39.15 seconds.

With Rock hardly asking for anything, Wise Dan came through the lane in 24.50 seconds and then proceeded to gallop out an additional three furlongs in 38.80 seconds, pulling up a mile in 1:42.45. The work ranked as the 14th-fastest of 18 workouts at the distance over firm turf.

Referring to the step around the turn, LoPresti said Rock told him Wise Dan slipped over a soft spot on the turf.

“I thought he lost a shoe,” LoPresti said. “Damien said when he went to change to his left lead, he slipped. He said he looked down because he thought he had overreached and stepped on his shoe, but after that, he said he felt like a million dollars.”

LoPresti said he’s seen works like this before from Wise Dan at Keeneland.

“I’ve seen him do that at Keeneland,” LoPresti said, “work slow like that and come back as unconcerned as he is, and I’m thinking, ‘Uh-oh, wonder what’s wrong with him,’ and then you run him, and he wins one of those races.

“Yes, I wanted to see one of those [fast] works like last year, but it might be a different turf course. I know one thing: He finished strong. It’s not like he was dying on the vine. I’m sure there are going to be people saying he’s lost a step. To say it wasn’t one of his usual works is not really fair because he was in hand the whole way.”

LoPresti said an endoscopic examination of Wise Dan’s lungs following the workout was clean. He planned to run some routine blood tests on Wise Dan.

LoPresti said he would work Wise Dan again next week, perhaps in company on dirt, before deciding whether to run him in the Fourstardave. LoPresti also said he wants to see the weight assignments for the one-mile race. Wise Dan won last year’s Fourstardave carrying 129 pounds. He subsequently has won four Grade 1 races on turf, with his only loss since then coming in the off-the-turf Shadwell Turf Mile.