Elate eyes BC following Alabama

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Bill Mott holds the record for most Breeders’ Cup Distaff wins by a trainer with five, and he looks to have another contender in Elate, who will be aimed at this year’s $2 million Distaff at Del Mar following her dominant 5 1/2-length victory in Saturday’s Grade 1 Alabama at Saratoga.

While Mott said Sunday he hasn’t specifically discussed the Distaff with Claiborne Farm and Adele Dilschneider, Elate’s owners and breeders, he admitted, “I was thinking about it this morning, wondering what the schedule might be.”

The schedule provides Mott with several options for Elate’s final race before the Nov. 3 Distaff. There is the Grade 1, $400,000 Beldame at Belmont Park on Sept. 30 and the Grade 1, $500,000 Spinster at Keeneland on Oct. 8. Both races, run at 1 1/8 miles, would require Elate to take on older fillies and mares for the first time. The Beldame is run around one turn, while the Spinster is run around two.

There is the Grade 1, $1 million Cotillion at Parx Racing on Sept. 23 for 3-year-old fillies, but Mott said he doesn’t want to cut her back to 1 1/16 miles, while adding, “It comes up a little quicker than I would want to run her back.”

A 3-year-old filly has beaten her elders in the Distaff in 10 of its 33 runnings. Mott did it in 2011 with Royal Delta and in 1998 with Ajina.

Mott said that Elate, who earned a career-best Beyer Speed Figure of 98 in the Alabama, “looked good” Sunday morning.

It Tiz Well, the Alabama runner-up, will likely be pointed to the Grade 1 Cotillion, trainer Jerry Hollendorfer said from California on Sunday morning. It Tiz Well, under Drayden Van Dyke, set the pace for the first mile in the Alabama before giving way to Elate in upper stretch. It Tiz Well held second by a neck over Salty.

“It was a little surprising to be on the lead,” Hollendorfer said. “Maybe Drayden was having a little bit of a tough time getting the horse to relax. I thought she ran very well. She wasn’t going to beat Billy Mott and Elate.”

Hollendorfer said It Tiz Well won’t return to Southern California until after the weekend, when her stablemate Songbird runs in the Grade 1 Personal Ensign.

Trainer Brian Lynch said that Unchained Melody, the Grade 2 Mother Goose winner who was eased in the Alabama and vanned off, was fine Sunday morning.

“Scoped clean, is sound as sound,” Lynch said. “We’ll live to fight another day.”