Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Derby, Preakness winners drill for Jim Dandy Stakes
ELMONT, N.Y. – Kentucky Derby winner Always Dreaming and Preakness winner Cloud Computing had markedly different types of workouts Sunday at Belmont Park as they prepare for a rematch in the Grade 2, $600,000 Jim Dandy Stakes on July 29 at Saratoga.
Always Dreaming, in his second work since he finished eighth to Cloud Computing in the Preakness, worked a halfmile in 49.42 seconds by himself over the training track. Under exercise rider Hector Ramos, Always Dreaming went his first quarter in 25.00 seconds and his second quarter in 24.42 before galloping out five furlongs in 1:02.93 and six furlongs in 1:17.07.
“It was a good, nice, relaxed work,” trainer Todd Pletcher said. “He seems to be happy. We’ve been focused on trying to get him to chill out a little bit, and I think we made progress.”
Always Dreaming was scheduled to van to Saratoga on Monday and likely will have two more workouts prior to the Jim Dandy.
About an hour earlier, Cloud Computing worked five furlongs in 59.01 seconds over the Belmont main track. While he started the work by himself, Cloud Computing picked up some company at the quarter pole in the form of Sandy’z Slew, a Richard Schosberg-trained 7-year-old gelding. Cloud Computing got on the bit and got his last quarter in 23.62 seconds. He galloped out six furlongs in 1:12.54.
Trainer Chad Brown said he planned to give Cloud Computing a stiff workout Sunday, but it turned out to be quicker than he had wanted.
“My horse just got ultracompetitive,” Brown said. “Although he was under a hold the whole way and worked well within himself, the other horse compromised the time of the work.”
Brown said Cloud Computing cooled out well and remains on schedule for the Jim Dandy. Cloud Computing could have his next work at Belmont, but he definitely will have his final work for the Jim Dandy at Saratoga, Brown said.
Meanwhile, Brown said Sunday that Practical Joke, the winner of Saturday’s Grade 2, $400,000 Dwyer Stakes, will be aimed at the Grade 1, $1 million Haskell Invitational at Monmouth Park on July 30.
Practical Joke won the Dwyer by two lengths over Tale of Silence. He ran a mile in 1:35.16 and earned a career-best 101 Beyer Speed Figure.
Though Practical Joke is 4 for 4 in one-turn races – including Grade 1 victories in the Hopeful and Champagne – and 0 for 4 in two-turn races, Brown believes it is worth giving Practical Joke a chance in the Haskell, a 1 1/8-mile race run around two turns.
“I thought he ran a really good race in the Blue Grass at a mile and an eighth,” said Brown, referring to the colt’s runner-up finish in the Grade 2 race. “All his numbers out of that race were very fast, and it’s a really lucrative race. If he was able to get the right pace setup in the Haskell, I think the horse is more than capable of winning.”
Brown said win or lose in the Haskell, Practical Joke likely will start in the Grade 1 Allen Jerkens Memorial, a sevenfurlong race formerly known as the King’s Bishop, at Saratoga on Aug. 26.
Brown is also pointing Timeline, the undefeated winner of the Grade 2 Peter Pan and Grade 3 Pegasus, to the Haskell Invitational. On Sunday, Timeline worked five furlongs in 1:01.48 in company with Paid Up Subscriber.
Tapwrit will train up to Travers
Tapwrit, the Belmont Stakes winner, will train up to the Grade 1, $1.25 million Travers Stakes at Saratoga on Aug. 26, trainer Todd Pletcher confirmed Sunday.
Aron Wellman, president of Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners, which owns Tapwrit in partnership with others, told Daily Racing Form on July 1 that training up to the Travers was being given strong consideration. That decision was finalized Saturday.
“He’s coming off a mile-anda-half race. I think he can get the mile and a quarter off the layoff, similar to what Keen Ice did yesterday,” Pletcher said Sunday, referring to Keen Ice’s victory off a threemonth layoff in Saturday’s Suburban Stakes. “He’s had a steady campaign. Everybody felt like taking our best shot at the Travers would be training up to it instead of running a hard race and then coming back four weeks later and run another hard race.”
Pletcher said Tapwrit was to ship to Saratoga on Monday and have his first breeze since the Belmont Stakes this Saturday.