OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer Michael Dilger will have more to think about this coming week than what Santa will bring him for Christmas.
Dilger will spend a good part of the next two weeks deciding whether to keep his soon-to-be 3-year-old stakes winner Jan’s Reserve sprinting or give him a shot to stretch out around two turns.
When Watershed finished fourth to Runhappy in the King’s Bishop Stakes at Saratoga in August, Watershed was a 7-2 contender and Runhappy an 11-1 outsider. Runhappy romped to a four-length win, the first of three stakes victories that include the Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Keeneland on Oct. 31.
They are scheduled to meet again in the $300,000 Malibu Stakes for 3-year-olds at seven furlongs at Santa Anita on Dec. 26, the opening day of the track’s winter-spring meeting.
NEW ORLEANS – Forever Unbridled, a good-looking winner of the $300,000 Comely Stakes last out at Aqueduct, is galloping daily at Fair Grounds for trainer Dallas Stewart and is being aimed at the $400,000 Sam Houston Ladies Classic on Jan. 30.
“She came out of the last race really well. She’ll work soon,” said Stewart. “It was a beautiful race for her up there.”
NEW ORLEANS – The 3-year-old sprinter Cinco Charlie is nearing a comeback race for trainer Steve Asmussen after being sidelined since a nose loss June 6 in the Grade 2 Woody Stephens Stakes at Belmont Park. Cinco Charlie worked four times during November at Churchill and has breezed twice here at Fair Grounds during December.
“He’s coming back very nicely, put in some good works and coming around well,” Asmussen said.
NEW ORLEANS – Larry Jones welcomed I’m a Chatterbox into his Fair Grounds barn late Tuesday night, the 3-year-old filly back in New Orleans after a brief post-Breeders’ Cup turnout at a Kentucky farm. Now, Jones will plot a course to keep I’m a Chatterbox separate from the other older-female stakes horse in the barn, Cassatt, who shipped to Remington and won the $102,300 She’s All In Stakes on Sunday.
Sunland Park has made some sweeping changes to its stakes schedule, simulcast programming, and grandstand facilities for the New Mexico track’s 72-date mixed meet that opens Friday. The season will run through April 19.
When Majestic Affair crossed the wire second – he was subsequently elevated to first – in Wednesday’s third race at Aqueduct, it enabled trainer Chad Brown to surpass the $20 million mark in purse earnings for 2015.
It is the first time in eight full seasons of training that Brown has surpassed the $20 million mark ($20,035,489). Only trainers Todd Pletcher (eight times since 2005) and Steve Asmussen (2007-09) have earned at least $20 million in purses in one year.
Kid Cruz will try to end his severe case of seconditis in Saturday’s $100,000 Queens County Stakes at Aqueduct.
Kid Cruz, the winner of the Grade 3 Dwyer Stakes in 2014, has finished second in each of his last four races, including a half-length defeat to Page McKenney in the Swatara Stakes at Penn National on Nov. 25. That was his second start following time off for surgery to remove a bone chip from a knee, a procedure he also had done following his third-place finish in the 2014 Travers.
La Verdad, who finished last in the Fall Highweight, is still at Belmont Park and is in training, trainer Linda Rice said Wednesday. While La Verdad is to be bred in 2016, her connections have not ruled out another start, potentially in the Grade 2 Barbara Fritchie Stakes at Laurel Park on Feb. 13.
“She could run in the Barbara Fritchie and then go to the breeding shed,” said Rice, who trains La Verdad for Sheila Rosenblum. “I don’t know what we’re doing yet.”
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Don’t shut the door on Palace just yet.
Though the 6-year-old New York-bred millionaire is still scheduled to join the stallion roster at Spendthrift Farm in Kentucky in 2016, the multiple Grade 1-winning Palace will make one more start in the $100,000 Gravesend Stakes at Aqueduct on Dec. 26.
Trainer Linda Rice said owner Anthony Miuccio “is able to race him till the end of the year, and he wants to run him there.”
