Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Mo Town confirmed for Wood
Tony Dutrow thinks a homecoming of sorts can get Mo Town to the Kentucky Derby.
Dutrow confirmed Thursday that Mo Town, the winner of the Grade 2 Remsen at Aqueduct last November, will return to the Big A for the Grade 2, $750,000 Wood Memorial on April 8, when he likely will need to finish in the top three to earn enough points to qualify for the Kentucky Derby.
Though Dutrow had considered running Mo Town in the Grade 1, $1 million Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park on April 1, he said Mo Town’s success at Aqueduct was his reason to run in the Wood.
“More than anything, he’s proven over that surface,” Dutrow said.
Dutrow said Javier Castellano will ride Mo Town in the Wood, replacing John Velazquez, who had ridden the son of Uncle Mo in his last three starts. Dutrow said Velazquez was unable to commit to riding Mo Town, and Dutrow didn’t want to wait.
Castellano, who rode Mo Town to a second-place finish in his debut at Saratoga last summer, is the regular rider of Gunnevera, the Fountain of Youth winner who is running next in the Florida Derby, and Malagacy, the undefeated winner of the Grade 2 Rebel who is likely running next in the Arkansas Derby on April 15.
Mo Town won the Remsen by 2 1/2 lengths last fall following a seven-length maiden victory at Belmont in his second career start.
But Mo Town faltered badly in his 3-year-old debut, finishing fifth as the 3-2 favorite in the Grade 2 Risen Star at Fair Grounds. Dutrow said Velazquez told him Mo Town didn’t handle the surface.
Dutrow planned to work Mo Town at Payson Park on Friday. He said he was undecided about whether Mo Town would have his final Wood work at Payson or Aqueduct. Dutrow said it depended on the New York weather forecast for the first weekend in April.
El Areeb works for Wood
At Laurel Park on Thursday, El Areeb was credited with a half-mile workout in 49.80 seconds in preparation for the Wood Memorial.
Trainer Cal Lynch said the work was actually 1 1/8 miles, but he was credited with only a half-mile move.
Lynch said he worked El Areeb behind two horses – Winter and Vorticity – and had jockey Trevor McCarthy aboard El Areeb. In the Grade 3 Gotham at Aqueduct on March 4, when El Areeb finished a distant third, El Areeb got caught up in a speed duel with True Timber.
“I put him in behind horses today. He was like two or three lengths behind those two horses and then finished up a little stronger than they did,” Lynch told the Laurel Park publicity department. “I just wanted to make sure Trevor felt the horse relaxing for him. It’s going to be [McCarthy] on him in the afternoon, so I just wanted to give him the feel of a race scenario and have him on there to know how he felt. He was very good today. I was very pleased.”
El Areeb will have two more works prior to the Wood.
Prior to the Gotham, El Areeb won the Jerome and Withers stakes over Aqueduct’s inner track as part of a four-race win streak.
West Point, Albertrani split
The West Point Thoroughbreds ownership group has moved 10 horses from trainer Tom Albertrani, ending a business relationship that began in 2009, the partnership’s president confirmed Wednesday.
Among the horses moved was Twilight Eclipse, a Grade 1winning gelding and earner of more than $2.1 million. The 8-year-old is with Graham Motion, a trainer with whom West Point has at least a dozen runners. Also receiving horses from West Point in this move were George Weaver, Tony Dutrow, and Tom Morley.
Twilight Eclipse won the Grade 1 Man o’ War in 2015 but has since gone just 1 for 15. He won four other graded stakes and has competed in four consecutive runnings of the Breeders’ Cup Turf.
“Tom Albertrani is a class guy,” Terry Finley, West Point’s president, wrote in a text. “I’ll be forever grateful for what he and his team did with Twilight Eclipse. This was a business decision.”
During their tenure together, West Point and Albertrani combined to win 55 races from 406 starters, with purse earnings of $6.2 million. Other stakes winners campaigned by them were Freedom Child, the winner of the 2013 Peter Pan; Empire Dreams, a five-time stakes-winning New York-bred who earned $812,751 and is now with Weaver; Belle of the Hall, and Awesome Vision.
“We had a good run. I guess they were looking to make changes going forward,” Albertrani said. “We had a good relationship, and we had a good run together.”
Albertrani said his stable size is still strong, with the backing of Godolphin Racing and others.
“We’re pretty solid, looking forward to the next crop coming in and going from there,” Albertrani said.