Susie Raisher Photo

Leading third crop sire Not This Time represented by Epicenter and Ain’t Life Grand in G1 Runhappy Travers

by NYRA Press Office

• Leading third crop sire Not This Time represented by Epicenter and Ain’t Life Grand in G1 Runhappy Travers
• Reed hopes for good showing from Rich Strike in G1 Runhappy Travers
• California invaders Ce Ce, Actuator put in final touches ahead of weekend stakes
• G1 winner Bella Sofia looking to bounce back in G1 Ballerina
• Kneedeepinsnow looks for Grade 1 glory in $600K Forego
• Velazquez reaches 1,000 wins at Saratoga
• Early look at Saratoga Race Course week 8 stakes probables

Albaugh Family Stables’ Not This Time may have had a short-lived racing career, but the son of Giant’s Causeway is making up for lost time as a highly influential stallion. The leading third crop stallion will be represented by two contestants in Saturday’s Grade 1, $1.25 million Runhappy Travers in 7-5 morning line favorite Epicenter and 20-1 Iowa-bred longshot Ain’t Life Grand.

Epicenter, owned by Winchell Thoroughbreds and trained by Hall of Famer Steve Asmussen, won the Grade 2 Jim Dandy at Saratoga in his most recent start. Bragging two graded stakes wins earlier this year at Fair Grounds Race Course, Epicenter was second as the favorite in both the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby and Grade 1 Preakness. Banking earnings in excess of $2 million, Epicenter is Not This Time’s highest earner this year.

Ain’t Life Grand, an RPM Thoroughbreds homebred, enters the Travers boasting four stakes victories at Prairie Meadows – two against state-breds and two against open company.

Not This Time is this year’s current leading third crop sire and is the sixth leading sire overall. His other graded stakes winners this year include Simplification, Arzak and Grade 1-winner Just One Time. He currently stands at Taylor Made Farm in Lexington, Kentucky for a $75,000 stud fee.

“We’re obviously excited, we’ve been very lucky. He’s looking like he’s going to be a stallion that will be at the top of the list, hopefully for years to come,” said Ben Taylor – President of Taylor Made Stallions, Inc. “He’s been very successful so far. He had a relatively low stud fee to start out with and the mares he’s gotten for that stud fee, I thought were good, but it’s not like he was getting the overall cream of the crop mares. So, he’s done a lot of this on his own.”

Not This Time never raced past his juvenile season. An emphatic 10-length winner at second asking in August 2016 at Ellis Park, he captured the Grade 3 Iroquois the following month at Churchill Downs by 8 3/4 lengths. The final start of his career was a runner-up effort to Classic Empire in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Santa Anita.

“We’ve been in the stallion business for a while now. You have these stallions, do the best you can and hope they have what it takes. I think he’s one of these horses that for some reason, genetically, he has what it takes to get runners,” Taylor said. “I think he’ll do better with the better mares he gets, because now you’re starting to see mares that are significantly better than what he started off with. I just think when that happens, the horses get every chance, they get raised at the best farms, they go to the best people to be broken and they go to the best trainers. Everything is just better. When you get to that level, hopefully we see even more success.”

The pedigree is one that Taylor is quite familiar with. Not This Time’s dam, Miss Macy Sue, still resides at Taylor Made and produced multiple Grade 1-winner and prominent sire Liam’s Map before producing Not This Time. In addition, the Taylor family also consigned Liam’s Map at the 2012 Keeneland September Yearling Sale, where he was purchased by St. Elias Stable for $800,000. Liam’s Map’s influential sire Unbridled’s Song also was consigned by Taylor Made as a yearling.

“We’ve been very close to the pedigree from Day One,” Taylor said. “That mare is a one of a kind mare. She’s beautiful. She could run and all her foals can run.

“We also had Giants Causeway’s mother [Mariah’s Storm] here and we sold her while she was carrying Giant’s Causeway,” he added. “So, we’ve known the pedigree from top to bottom for years.”

Not This Time hails from the prominent sire line of Storm Cat, and Taylor said Not This Time looks a lot like him as well as his sire Giant’s Causeway.

“If you really look at Storm Cat and pictures of him when he was a young horse, Not This Time is dead on,” Taylor said. “He’s just a bigger version of Storm Cat. With Not This Time, you can see Giant’s Causeway in him and he’s absolutely beautiful. His foals look just like him. When you see his horses out on the track, you can see just how much like him they look.”

Not This Time has a pedigree that pairs well with a variety of different mares, according to Taylor.

“They can run on dirt, turf, short, long. They seem to do a lot of different things,” Taylor mentioned. “If you breed to the right mare, they can definitely get a mile and a quarter but they also have a lot of speed. Another thing I see, is at all levels those horses try to win, even in the lower end races.”

A victory in the Travers from either Not This Time progeny would be a home run for Taylor Made.

“I think it would give us a stallion that would be looked at as one of the top five stallions in the United States,” Taylor said. “He’s only 8-years-old. Some of the stallions ahead of him have four or five times as many foals. So, he’s got to that level with a limited number of runners.”

With Not This Time becoming one of the most sought after stallions in North America, the quality of his book of mares has improved immensely. Mares that visited Not This Time this past breeding season include the dams of Epicenter [Silent Candy], Simplification [Simply Confection], and Grade 1-winners Oscar Performance [Devine Actress], Patternrecognition [Almost A Valentine], and Chi Town Lady [Toni’s Hollyday].

Reed hopes for good showing from Rich Strike in G1 Runhappy Travers 

Trainer Eric Reed will be starting his first runner in the Grade 1, $1.25 million Runhappy Travers on Saturday at Saratoga Race Course, sending out RED TR-Racing’s Rich Strike for his run at another top level victory after shocking the world with his 80-1 rail-skimming victory in the Grade 1 Kentucky Derby this May.

“Who would have ever thought I’d be in the Travers? Not me,” Reed said, with a laugh. “I’m glad to be here and I hope ‘Richie’ runs his normal race, because win, lose or draw, everybody will respect him.”

Rich Strike made his final preparations on Friday morning over Saratoga’s main track.   

“He’s doing really good,” Reed said. “Today was his last day on the track and he was real happy, bucking and playing on the way back. We just galloped him a mile and a quarter, and for him, that’s a real light day. He’s ready. He just has to keep his composure tomorrow and he’ll try to do the impossible again.” 

Normally, the winner of the “Run for the Roses” would be at the forefront of the conversation in any race, but Rich Strike faces the unusual scenario of flying somewhat under the radar in a loaded Runhappy Travers field that includes formidable Kentucky Derby runner-up Epicenter and Grade 1 Haskell Invitational winner Cyberknife.

The betting public has turned their attention elsewhere after Rich Strike, 10-1 on the morning line for the Runhappy Travers, ran a disappointing sixth-of-8 in the Grade 1 Belmont Stakes presented by NYRA Bets in June. There, he stayed to the outside of rivals instead of an inside trip like the Kentucky Derby and never threatened, fighting with jockey Sonny Leon for much of the 1 1/2 miles and wanting to maneuver towards the rail.

Although he enters from a distant effort in the Belmont, Rich Strike displayed his talent and heart in the Kentucky Derby when he broke from the outermost post 20 and made his way to inside position under expert handling from Leon. He eventually worked his way through traffic down the stretch and was forced to quickly angle to the outside of a tiring Messier before coming away with the three-quarter-length victory over Travers favorites Epicenter, Zandon and a well-beaten Cyberknife.

Reed said he hopes that the Travers will change peoples’ minds about Rich Strike and that he won’t be seen as a one-time wonder going forward.

“It just bothers me because everybody said that the Belmont isn’t for horses like him and doesn’t play good for horses like him, and then he runs like they said and they say, ‘see, he’s no good,’” Reed explained. “He’s got to have everything go right, but he can do it – he’s already done it and did it easily. He had trouble in the stretch of the Derby and had to wait quite a while in the turn. [But] I know Epicenter is on his game and [trainer] Steve [Asmussen] wants it bad.”

Reed, a longtime horseman with nearly 1,500 wins on his resume, said winning the Travers isn’t about him, but about the charismatic son of Keen Ice who has taken him to the heights that all trainers dream of.

“I want it for him. Just to solidify his place, and if he won, I’m sure it would give him a shot at the 3-year-old title,” said Reed. “I want everything the horse can have. For me, it would be fun and great, but it’s always been about ‘Richie’ for me. It sets a place in history. He’s already got that, but maybe he’ll finally get some respect from people. If he comes running down the stretch like he has done in every other race this year other than the Belmont, that’s all I ask of him.”

Rich Strike will emerge from post 2 with Leon in the irons again.

California invaders Ce Ce, Actuator put in final touches ahead of weekend stakes 

Following a cross-country trip from California, Bo Hirsch’s champion mare Ce Ce got reacquainted with Saratoga Race Course Friday morning ahead of her return start in Sunday’s Grade 1, $500,000 Ballerina Handicap.

Along with her Michael McCarthy-trained stablemate Actuator, who is set to run in Saturday’s Grade 1, $500,000 H. Allen Jerkens Memorial for 3-year-old sprinters, Ce Ce galloped 1 1/4 miles over the main track and then schooled in the paddock. 

“We just wanted to come over and give them something to do,” McCarthy said. “Both seemed like they handled the trip well. Actuator seemed like he got over the racetrack nicely this morning. The filly takes her game on the road. Nothing really fazes her."

Ce Ce ran third in last year’s Ballerina behind Gamine, then defeated that rival in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint to clinch the Eclipse Award as North America’s top female sprinter. The Ballerina is a “Win and You’re In” qualifier for this year’s $1 million Filly & Mare Turf November 5 at Keeneland.

The 6-year-old Ce Ce already clinched a Breeders’ Cup berth for her dominant last out triumph in the Grade 2 Princess Rooney July 2 at Gulfstream Park.

“We’ll do the same thing tomorrow, gallop a mile and a quarter,” McCarthy said. “We just want to keep her in her routine. She’s very easy.”

Ce Ce drew the rail in a field of seven for the seven-furlong Ballerina, where she will carry topweight of 125 pounds including her regular rider, Hall of Famer Victor Espinoza. 

“You don’t come 3,000 miles, obviously, to draw the one hole, but in these big races anything can happen. That’s part of the game. I’ll let Victor work out a trip from there. I’m not too worried about it,” McCarthy said.

“He has a lot of faith in her and we all have a lot of faith in each other, so it works out great that way,” he added. “These big kinds of days like that, Victor is cool as a cucumber. They’ll pop on out of there and let him kind of feel his way around there.”

Ce Ce owns 10 wins and nearly $2.3 million in purse earnings from 20 lifetime starts traveling coast to coast, with prior Grade 1 wins in the 2020 Beholder Mile and Apple Blossom. She also won the Princess Rooney and Grade 3 Chillingworth in 2021 and Grade 2 Azeri this year.

She has already given McCarthy, a former assistant to Hall of Famer Todd Pletcher, his first Eclipse Award as a trainer, but he hoped a victory Sunday would help make a case for Ce Ce to join his mentor in the hall, located across the street from the racetrack.

“Strong mare, always has been. Shows up and lays it down every time, and I would expect more or less the same thing here on Sunday,” McCarthy said. “I would have to think if things were to work out properly tomorrow that she’s done a lot and it would be nice, maybe, for her to have a plaque over on Union Avenue.”

Black Type Thoroughbreds’ Actuator will break from post position 4 in a field of nine for the Jerkens led by multiple Grade 1 winner Jack Christopher and Gunite, winner of the Grade 1 Hopeful in 2020 and Grade 2 Amsterdam July 31 at Saratoga.

Hall of Fame jockey John Velazquez, who earned his record-extending 1,000th career Saratoga victory Thursday, has the call on the Grade 3 Indiana Derby winner. Actuator is 2-for-2 this year, breaking his maiden at the Jerkens distance June 8 at Churchill Downs before stretching out to 1 1/16 miles in Indiana. 

“Actuator is doing well. [It’s a] big ask, obviously. With Jack Christopher and some other horses in there it’s salty competition but I like where we drew,” McCarthy said. “I thought his race was very gritty in the Indiana Derby. I loved the way he broke his maiden going seven-eighths so I was anxious to go ahead and try him one turn again and see what happens.”

G1 winner Bella Sofia looking to bounce back in G1 Ballerina

It hasn’t been the kind of summer to which trainer Rudy Rodriguez has become accustomed to at Saratoga Race Course, but Michael Imperio, Medallion Racing, Sofia Soares, Vincent Scuderi and Parkland Thoroughbreds’ Grade 1 winner Bella Sofia can change that in a big way in Sunday’s Grade 1, $500,000 Ballerina.

The seven-furlong Ballerina for fillies and mares 3-and-older is a ‘Win and You’re In’ qualifier to the Grade 1, $1 million Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint November 5 at Keeneland. California invader Ce Ce, third in last year’s Ballerina during her Eclipse Award season as Champion Female Sprinter, heads the field of seven. 

Since going out on his own in 2010, Rodriguez has won 136 races at Saratoga averaging 11 wins and nearly $714,000 in purse earnings. He has ranked in the top 10 in wins in 10 of his first 12 years, finishing third with 14 in 2018 and fourth with a career-best 15 in 2015. In 2017 and 2015 he topped $1 million in purse earnings for the meet.

Rodriguez registered his first winner this summer with Wudda U Think Now in the John Morrissey August 6, and won again with Mariah’s Fortune on Wednesday. His fewest number of wins at Saratoga is seven, coming in his first year. 

Bella Sofia, who captured the Grade 1 Longines Test last summer during her 3-year-old campaign, ran third as the favorite in the Grade 2 Honorable Miss July 27. Rodriguez has nine seconds and eight thirds at Saratoga this summer, including Hot Peppers in the Grade 1 Longines Test. He was third with a pair of 2-year-olds, Please Baby July 23 and Moonflyer August 6, and fourth with Apple Picker in the Grade 3 Adirondack for 2-year-old fillies August 7.

In the Belmont Park spring-summer meet that preceded Saratoga, Rodriguez ranked fourth with 22 wins and fifth with nearly $1.4 million in purse earnings.

“We had a great meet at Belmont. All our horses ran big,” Rodriguez said. “I expected a little bit more from the babies we brought here, but they didn’t show up the way I thought. We have a couple tough beats where we could have been winners. But, everybody comes to play so you’ve got to keep playing. It’s tough.” 

The lightly-raced Bella Sofia has been a tough customer for Rodriguez with six wins, one second and one third from just nine career starts. The Test was her first stakes win, followed by a victory in the Grade 2 Gallant Bloom and a fourth to Ce Ce in the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint. She began this year with wins in the Grade 3 Vagrancy May 14 and Grade 2 Bed o’ Roses June 10, both at Belmont.

“She’s very nice, and we’re very, very happy to have her,” Rodriguez said. “We’re just enjoying the ride.”

In the six-furlong Honorable Miss, regular rider Luis Saez opted to keep Bella Sofia off the pace and ration her natural speed. She ran second through a quarter-mile in 22.72 seconds and a half in 45.87 but was passed by Frank’s Rockette and eventual winner Kimari entering the stretch and wound up beaten 6 1/4 lengths.

“Luis rode the race the way I thought he would ride it, but I guess she doesn’t want to take back. She broke good and Luis kind of took back and waited, and I don’t think she wanted to do that,” Rodriguez said. “To me, I thought that was the perfect spot to let her finish up good but by the three-eighths pole she looked like she was [done]. I’m not too sure what happened. Sunday, if everything goes according to plan, we’ll put [her] in the race and [they can] come and get [her]. No taking back.”

Saez will ride Bella Sofia back in the Ballerina from post position 5 at 123 pounds, two fewer than topweight Ce Ce. 

“The other day, Luis asked me what I thought and I told him, ‘You’re in charge.’ I thought he rode him perfect,” Rodriguez said. “Unfortunately, that didn’t happen the way I thought it would happen and the other filly ran a huge, huge race, too. Those races are tough, so you can’t take anything away from her.” 

Rodriguez also felt that Bella Sofia left some of her race behind after acting up in the paddock, similar to the way she did at Del Mar last fall in the Breeders’ Cup. 

“I was kind of disappointed the way she ran at Del Mar. I know the race didn’t set up for us, but I don’t think she ran her race that day,” Rodriguez said. “She’s gotten bigger and stronger since last year. She acted up very bad in the paddock last time, so we schooled her in the paddock. You try to put all the pieces together and figure things out. I’ve been trying to do whatever I can to help her mentally. She acted up almost the same way at Del Mar, so I try to avoid that situation.”

Rodriguez said he hasn’t looked beyond Sunday’s race but would love to have Bella Sofia around as a 5-year-old in 2023 and, eventually, stretch her out beyond seven furlongs, a distance where she is 2-for-3 lifetime. The connections gave consideration to the one-mile Grade 3 Go for Wand last December at Aqueduct but passed.

 “I haven’t talked to the owners about it yet, but hopefully they can keep her over here for next year. She’s a young, lightly-raced horse. Look at Ce Ce, she’s still running,” he said. “I believe she still has room to improve. If they let me, I would like to try her at one mile. Last year I wanted to try her in the mile race at Aqueduct, but we decided to give her a break.”

Kneedeepinsnow looks for Grade 1 glory in $600K Forego

Jeremy Sussman, Ten Strike Racing and Cory Moelis Racing’s Kneedeepinsnow looks to spoil the party in Saturday’s Grade 1, $600,000 Forego, a seven-furlong main track sprint for older horses, at Saratoga Race Course.

Trained by Matt Shirer, the 6-year-old gelding by Flat Out was last seen finishing second to reigning Champion Sprinter Jackie’s Warrior in the Grade 1 Vanderbilt on July 30 at the Spa. Kneedeepinsnow will face that same rival Saturday, along with five others when he breaks from the outermost post 7 in rein to returning rider Ricardo Santana, Jr.

“He shipped up only a week before that last stakes race he ran here,” said Shirer. “Sometimes things can be a bit hectic. The horses don’t quite settle and stuff, but now he’s gotten a month or so between being here and the race. He’s got two breezes over the Oklahoma, he schooled yesterday in the paddock and everything went good.”

Shirer said he’s enjoyed the ride with Kneedeepinsnow, who was haltered out of an optional-claimer for $80,000 in April at Keeneland and has since run him three times, all at stakes level, and has not missed the board in any of those starts. He was second in the Work All Week at Hawthorne in June first off the claim and followed that run with a third in the Kelly’s Landing at Churchill Downs July 2.

“We don’t necessarily expect to win, it’d be great if we did,” said Shirer. “It’s the graveyard of champions so we’ll see what happens. It’s been a good experience coming up here and getting to run against some of the best horses in the country, the best trainers in the country. So, it’ll be exciting tomorrow.”

Shirer said a lot stood out about Kneedeepinsnow for them to make the claim.

“He was good on paper. He had good numbers and everything,” said Shirer. “He had a lot of traffic trouble in some of the stakes he’d run in previously, and after watching the replays we thought he had a little bit more to him. Some of those numbers, without traffic trouble, he might’ve won one or two of those races, so we went ahead and took a shot to claim him and it’s worked out so far.”

Despite having a small stable here at Saratoga, Shirer has compiled a good record of 4-1-1-1, which he said is a testament to using his stall space responsibly and realistically.

“I’ve only got about four stalls so we just tried to bring horses that would be competitive and try to run them in the right races,” said Shirer.

Velazquez reaches 1,000 wins at Saratoga

Hall of Fame jockey John Velazquez guided Juddmonte homebred Precursory to victory in Race 8 on Thursday at Saratoga Race Course to secure a record extending 1,000th win at Saratoga Race Course.

Trained by Hall of Famer Bill Mott, Velazquez needed all of his guile to guide the sophomore daughter of Empire Maker to a narrow neck victory in the seven furlong maiden special weight sprint for fillies and mares 3-years-old and up.

“When they come down to a photo finish, if you’re betting, you might want to put your money on him. He’s been very tough when it comes down to the wire," Mott said. "He’s a great rider and we’ve ridden him for a number of years. To win one that he set this record on is very meaningful. He’s won a lot of races for me and ridden for us for the last 25 to 30 years."

Velazquez, who serves as the chairman of the Jockeys’ Guild Board of Directors, has won at least one race at Saratoga for the past 33 years, dating back to his first Spa score aboard Color Blue on August 5, 1990. The 50-year-old native of Puerto Rico, who was inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 2012, is also Saratoga’s all-time leader in stakes wins [198] and Grade 1 wins [48].

Velazquez posted single-digit wins his first four seasons at Saratoga, notching three in 1990, eight in 1991, two in 1992 and four in 1993. He has since posted double-digit wins in each season from 1994 onward and holds a significant lead over fellow Hall of Famer Javier Castellano [752 wins] and retired Hall of Famer Jerry Bailey [693]. Heading into Friday's card, the 30-year-old Irad Ortiz, Jr., who has 538 wins at Saratoga and leads the current meet with 44 victories, would need to average 23 wins per meet for the next 20 seasons to reach the 1,000 mark.

But Velazquez said he has no intention of slowing down following the landmark score.

"If I'm still getting the opportunity and I'm healthy and they're still riding me - I'll ride for a little longer," Velazquez said. "The day that I feel I'm not having fun and I'm not having the opportunity to ride the good horses, I can say bye anytime. I'm happy with what I've done and I’m doing what I'm doing because I'm happy and I love what I do. I don't have to do it, but I'm enjoying it."

The Hall of Famer is enjoying his craft so much that he will ride at two racetracks on Friday with three mounts at Saratoga, including aboard Let Her Inspire U in the $200,000 Fleet Indian in Race 5, before traveling to Charles Town where he has a trio of mounts, led by a start in the Grade 2, $1 million Charles Town Classic aboard the Pletcher-trained multiple Grade 1-winner Mind Control.

Velazquez notched the first of his five Saratoga titles in 1998 [31 wins]. In 2004, Velazquez won the Saratoga title with a then record 64 victories on the season. He also led the Spa colony in wins in 2003 [61], 2010 [57] and 2011 [54].

On September 9, 2001, he visited the Saratoga winner’s circle six times for a single-day record, and on July 27, 2013, he notched his 694th victory here to became Saratoga’s all-time winningest jockey.

Velazquez, who captured four consecutive NYRA riding titles from 2001-04, won career race 3,000 on July 29, 2004 aboard Runingforpresident at Saratoga on a day in which more than 35,000 fans received a John Velazquez bobble-head doll.

In October 2013, Velazquez became North America’s all-time money-earning jockey. He holds the title to this day with purse earnings in excess of $455 million. A two-time winner of the Eclipse Award for Outstanding Jockey, Velazquez was honored with the George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award in 2009. His Classic scores include a pair of wins in the Belmont Stakes (Rags to Riches, 2007; Union Rags, 2012) and Kentucky Derby triumphs with Authentic (2020), Always Dreaming (2017) and Animal Kingdom (2011). He boasts 18 Breeders’ Cup wins in his storied career.

Velazquez took to social media on Friday morning to share his joy at securing the special win, tweeting, “Thank you very much to the horses, owners, trainers and their help. Agents and valets, NYRA and the Fans in Saratoga for the special day. #1,000.”

For more about Velazquez, including comments from Hall of Fame trainer Todd Pletcher, Hall of Fame jockey Gary Stevens, and Jockeys Guild President and CEO Terry Meyocks, please visit our feature story from Lynne Snierson: https://www.nyra.com/saratoga/news/hall-of-famer-john-velazquez-closing-in-on-his-1,000th-win-at-saratoga-race-course.

Early look at Saratoga Week 8 stakes probables

Thursday, September 1

$150K P.G. Johnson

Probable: Be Your Best (Horacio De Paz), Damaso (Timothy Hamm), Indian Spideroo (S. Matthew Kintz), Lady Jasmine (David Donk)

Possible: Born Dapper (Jonathan Thomas)

Friday, September 2

G2 Prioress

Probable: Bank On Anna (Phil Serpe), Half is Enough (Michael Trombetta), Hot Peppers (Rudy Rodriguez), Lady Scarlet (Mike Maker), Smash Ticket (Rob Atras), Sterling Silver (Tom Albertrani), Union Lake (John Terranova)

Possible: Wicked Halo (Steve Asmussen)

$150K Lucky Coin

Probable: Big Package (Donk), Dancing Buck (Michelle Nevin), Fauci (Philip Antonacci), Proven Strategies (Mark Casse), Thin White Duke (Donk), Voodoo Zip (Christophe Clement)

Possible: Nothing Better (Jorge Duarte, Jr.)

Saturday, September 3

G1 Jockey Club Gold Cup BC WAYI

Probable: Americanrevolution (Todd Pletcher), Dynamic One (Pletcher), First Captain (Shug McGaughey), Informative (Uriah St. Lewis), Keepmeinmind (Pletcher), Olympiad (Bill Mott), Tax (Danny Gargan), Untreated (Pletcher)

Possible: Brooklyn Strong (Victor Barboza, Jr.), Chess Chief (Dallas Stewart)

G2 Flower Bowl

Probable: Coastana (Cherie De Vaux), Temple City Terror (Brendan Walsh), Virginia Joy (Chad Brown), War Like Goddess (Bill Mott)

Possible: Flanigan’s Cove (Shug McGaughey), Hendy Woods (Mark Casse)

G3 Saranac

Probable: Ethereal Road (D. Wayne Lukas)

Possible: Ready to Purrform (Brad Cox)

Sunday, September 4

G1 Spinaway BC Dirt Dozen

Probable: Aunt Shirley (Rodolphe Brisset), Just Cindy (Eddie Kenneally), Kaling (Pletcher), Leave No Trace (Phil Serpe), Naughty Gal (Lukas), Sabra Tuff (Stewart), Wonder Wheel (Mark Casse)

Monday, September 5

G1 Hopeful

Probable: Blazing Sevens (Chad Brown), Bourbon Bash (Lukas), Disarm (Asmussen), Forte (Pletcher), Mo Strike (Cox)

Possible: Congruent (Antonio Sano)

G3 Bernard Baruch

Probable: Dynadrive (Tom Morley), Emaraaty (Chad Brown), Mouillage (Chad Brown), Winters Back (Pletcher)