Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Brown has three for Diana Stakes
ELMONT, N.Y. – With Mother Nature forcing the postponement of turf workouts at Belmont Park from Sunday to Monday, trainers had to call an audible in preparing their horses for upcoming stakes.
Chad Brown had to move 10 workers from Sunday to Monday, including the Grade 1-winning duo of A Raving Beauty and Sistercharlie, who will head the field for Saturday’s Grade 1 Diana Stakes at Saratoga. Brown is expected to have three in the Diana when entries for Saturday’s card are taken Wednesday.
As they’ve seemingly done week after week for the last month or so, A Raving Beauty and Sistercharlie worked together, with neither giving an inch through a half-mile drill in 49.43 seconds. They went perhaps a furlong shorter than they might have had they worked Sunday, but it was still another solid move for the pair.
Brown, who has won the last two runnings of the Diana, also plans to run New Money Honey in the race Saturday. She has been training at Saratoga for most of the summer and last Saturday worked a half-mile in 49.80 over the Saratoga main track.
Brown had seven nominated to the Diana, but has other plans for some of those runners. Fourstar Crook, who beat Sistercharlie in the New York Stakes, will likely run in the Grade 1 Beverly D. on Aug. 11 at Arlington. Brown said that Fourstar Crook missed a workout last week after kicking a stall wall and bruising a foot. She did work Monday, going a half-mile in 49.57 seconds over the Belmont turf in company with Off Limits.
Off Limits, winless in three starts this year after closing out last year with a win in the Grade 1 Matriarch at Del Mar, is likely to wait for the Grade 2, $400,000 Ballston Spa on Aug. 25 at Saratoga.
Quidura, runner-up to Lady Eli in last year’s Diana when in the barn of Graham Motion, was beaten a neck by stablemate Fifty Five in a Sunday allowance at Belmont in her first start for Brown and first start since last October.
“She didn’t like the soft ground yesterday and she did get a little worked up in the paddock, which kind of caught us off guard,” Brown said Monday at Saratoga. “So we’ve got a couple of things we can work on.”
Fifty Five is likely to make her next start in the Yaddo Stakes for New York-breds on Aug. 24, Brown said.
Others expected to run in the Diana include Proctor’s Ledge, winner of both the Lake George and Lake Placid in Saratoga last summer, and Hawksmoor, who on Monday worked five furlongs in 1:02 over the Tapeta surface at Fair Hill, a training center in Maryland.
Coaching Club top two work
Monomoy Girl, the leader of the 3-year-old filly division, and Midnight Bisou, perhaps her top challenger, put in their final workouts Sunday morning for their showdown in next Sunday’s Grade 1 Coaching Club American Oaks at Saratoga.
At Churchill Downs, Kentucky Oaks and threetime Grade 1 winner Monomoy Girl worked a half-mile in 48.80 seconds in company with Majestic Affair, a 6-year-old gelding coming off a secondlevel allowance win. While the official time was given for a half-mile, trainer Brad Cox said Monomoy Girl galloped out five furlongs in 1:00.80 and six furlongs in 1:14.
“It was a really good move. I’m pleased with it,” Cox said by phone from Churchill. “As long as everything looks good tomorrow morning, we’ll send her up.”
Cox said Monomoy Girl will leave Kentucky on Monday night by van and arrive at Saratoga on Tuesday morning.
Monomoy Girl, a daughter of Tapizar, is 7 for 8 overall and 4 for 4 this year. She has won three consecutive Grade 1 stakes: the Ashland, Kentucky Oaks, and Acorn.
“Her weight’s great, she’s moving well, her conditioning is good,” Cox said. “We’re sitting in a good spot with her.”
At Saratoga, Midnight Bisou worked a half-mile in 50.73 seconds over the Oklahoma training track. It was her first work since she won the Grade 2 Mother Goose by six lengths at Belmont on June 30.
Asmussen said he only worked Midnight Bisou once in part because she shipped from Kentucky to Belmont and then from Belmont to Saratoga following the Mother Goose.
“That’s quite a bit in 22 days,” Asmussen said. “I’m just looking for her to be 100 percent. I expect her to come out of it in good shape and maintain the attitude she’s kept since she came into our barn.”
Entries for the Coaching Club American Oaks will be taken on Thursday. Others expected to enter are Eskimo Kisses and Gio Game. Chocolate Martini and Cash Out are possible.
Voodoo Song has options
Voodoo Song, who won four races at Saratoga last summer, is headed back to the Spa for this year’s meet. How often he runs could depend on how ambitious his connections get.
Voodoo Song won Saturday’s $150,000 Forbidden Apple Stakes at Belmont by one length over Projected. He ran a mile in 1:31.67 and earned a career-best Beyer Speed Figure of 102.
On Monday, trainer Linda Rice said the options for Voodoo Song could include the $100,000 Lure Stakes on Aug. 4 as a prep for the $150,000 West Point for New York-breds on Aug. 24.
However, if owner Barry Schwartz wants to get more ambitious, Voodoo Song could make his next start in the Grade 1, $500,000 Fourstardave on Aug. 11. The Fourstardave is likely to attract World Approval, last year’s Fourstardave and Breeders’ Cup Mile winner and male turf champion, as well as two-time Grade 1 winner Heart to Heart.