Mines and Magic brings class to interesting Thursday card

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – It’s a bit more than horseplayers might have a right to expect, the three allowances that dot the Thursday program at Churchill Downs. With the usual onslaught of high-profile racing on tap for the final week of a fall meet that ends Nov. 26, the richer overnight races typically are saved for the undercards of those bigger stakes dates.

Nonetheless, fans will gladly take it. A 10-race Thursday card, which starts at the usual 1 p.m. Eastern, will serve up allowances as races 4, 6, and 9, with the last two scheduled for turf with oversubscribed fields. The long-range forecast calls for mostly dry conditions in this area Monday through Thursday, except for a possibility of rain Wednesday. Clearly the complexion of the last two allowances would be significantly altered if they’re transferred to the main track.

Here is a quick rundown of those Thursday co-features:

Race 4 (2:30): Away more than four months, Mines and Magic returns as strictly the horse to beat in this $68,000 third-level race for fillies and mares. Going a one-turn mile out of the Longfield Avenue chute, her fitness might come into question, but there’s no doubting the class edge she brings into this as the winner of the Dogwood Stakes at the 2016 September meet.

Trained by Vicki Oliver for her father, G. Watts Humphrey Jr., Mines and Magic was assigned the rail post in a field of six after twice being narrowly defeated in her most recent starts at this same level at the Churchill spring meet.

Clearly the wild card in the lineup is Polar River, who gets first Lasix after having raced exclusively at Meydan in Dubai. In March 2016, when trained by Doug Watson, Polar River became a Kentucky Oaks possibility by winning the Group 3 United Arab Emirates Oaks and finishing second to Lani in the UAE Derby, although ultimately it was decided not to send her here. After going off form in subsequent starts, she was sent to trainer Brendan Walsh, for whom she has had six workouts at Keeneland and Churchill since early October.

Race 6 (3:36): Two-year-olds going two turns on turf at this relatively early stage of their careers often make for a guessing game for handicappers, and that might well be the case with this $62,000 first-level race going a mile. Miss Mo Mentum, who forced the pace in the Grade 3 Jessamine last month at Keeneland before fading to last, is a lukewarm morningline favorite in a field that includes a handful of viable challengers.

Lenamarie, a sharp last-out maiden winner as the favorite over the Keeneland turf, is one of those threats given further improvement for trainer Eddie Kenneally, who got away to a terrific start at this meet with five wins and three seconds from his first 12 starters.

Race 9 (5:06): Walsh is a major figure in this $65,000 second-level race, too, as the trainer of another class horse entered off a lengthy layoff: Saham, whose victory in the Jefferson Cup here more than two years ago came in his first incarnation under the Walsh shed row. Now 5, Saham is one of four older horses in the main body of 10 entered for a $62,500 claiming option that is part of the race conditions.

CHURCHILL DOWNS/COADY PHOTOGRAPHY Mines and Magic’s last win was the Dogwood in September 2016.