Breakin the Fever not the same

Time catches up to all athletes, and 2018 has not been kind to the 6-year-old Breakin the Fever, who on Tuesday will try to regain his past form in the $50,000 Leon Reed Memorial Stakes.

Breakin the Fever, the reigning three-time Horse of the Year at Finger Lakes, is winless in three starts this season. He will return from a three-month layoff in the Reed Memorial, a six-furlong sprint for New York-breds that he has won in each of the past three years.

Breakin the Fever, bred, owned, and trained by the husband-and-wife team of Ronnie and Debra Breed, is 20 for 35 in his career with earnings of $570,000. At Finger Lakes, where he has earned $340,000, he is 17 for 23, with six stakes victories. He scored the richest win of his career at Belmont Park in the fall of 2016 when he outfought Weekend Hideaway in the slop to score by a half-length in the Hudson on New York Showcase Day.

Breakin the Fever has shown his typical sharp early speed in all of his starts this year but wilted in the final furlong each time.

Finger Lakes had a late spring this year, and Ronnie Breed was not surprised when Breakin the Fever came up short in a May allowance race that was intended to set him up for a title defense in the George W. Barker Stakes. But Breakin the Fever finished fifth in the Barker and then fourth in a July allowance.

He comes into the Reed Memorial off an inconsistent work pattern, and his past performances don’t show an official breeze since Sept. 8.

Nazario Alvarado has ridden Breakin the Fever in 16 straight races, but Oscar Gomez takes over Tuesday. Alvarado rides the Breeds’ second horse in the race, Winston’s Chance.

Breakin the Fever is the 8-5 morning-line favorite in the six-horse field. Saratoga Giro and Bavaro are his chief rivals.

Saratoga Giro, a 5-year-old trained by Paul Barrow, has finished in front of Breakin the Fever three times this year. He outdueled Breakin the Fever in his May allowance try and in the Barker. Saratoga Giro came from off the pace to finish second in the July allowance race.

Most recently, Saratoga Giro was second in a no-conditions statebred allowance at Saratoga, splitting the winner, Celtic Chaos, and the nowretired Weekend Hideaway.

Bavaro made the first 10 starts of his career downstate at Aqueduct and Belmont, including a New York Stallion Series win. But he found a home this summer in the cozy confines of Finger Lakes, where he is 4 for 5 against allowance company for trainer Jeremiah Englehart.

With Breakin the Fever, Saratoga Giro, and Bavaro all confirmed front-runners, something will have to give in the Reed Memorial.

The race is named for the assistant starter who was killed in a gate accident at Finger Lakes in 2005.