Stacelita breezes for Flower Bowl; Zagora could attempt
Spinster
With Ramon Dominguez aboard, Martin Schwartz’s STACELITA (Fr) (Monsun)
completed major preparations for Saturday’s Flower Bowl Invitational S. (G1)
with a 1:02.94 five-furlong breeze over Belmont Park’s soft inner turf Sunday
morning.
“We’re very happy,” trainer Chad Brown said. “We’re on target for the Flower
Bowl. Ramon is happy, so I’m happy.”
The Flower Bowl will be third start in the United States for Stacelita, a
four-time Group 1 winner in her native France. In two stateside starts, she
finished third against males for trainer Jean-Claude Rouget in the United
Nations S. (G1) in July at Monmouth and won the Beverly D. S. (G1) in August at
Arlington Park.
Should the five-year-old mare perform well in the Flower Bowl, her next
objective will be the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Turf (G1) on November 4 at
Churchill Downs.
“We’ll take it one race at a time, but when Mr. Schwartz hired me he had
three specific races in mind,” Brown said. “We won the first one, so we have two
more to go.”
Brown has yet to make a decision on the next start for Schwartz’s Diana S.
(G1) winner ZAGORA (Fr) (Green Tune), who last Sunday was seventh as the
favorite in the Canadian S. (Can-G2) at Woodbine.
“(Jockey Javier Castellano) just felt she didn’t handle a one-turn race,”
Brown said. “He just never felt comfortable under her. We’ll just kind of
regroup with her and draw a line through it. It’s fairly uncharacteristic of her
to run that way.”
One race under consideration for Zagora is the Spinster S. (G1) on October 9
at Keeneland.
“It’s back in 22 days; I just don’t feel she ran much in the last race,”
Brown said. “I want to take a look at it, and if I don’t do that I may just
regroup and focus on next year with her. I think she’ll have a big year next
year. We’ll see how she’s doing all week and see where her energy level is at.”
Brown said both Ken and Sarah Ramsey’s BIG BLUE KITTEN (Kitten’s Joy) and
Gary and Mary West’s CASINO HOST (Dynaformer) are under consideration for the
Jamaica (G1), a 1 1/8-mile turf race to be held at Belmont October 8.
On Sunday, National Museum of Racing Hall of Fame S. (G2) winner Big Blue
Kitten breezed five furlongs on the firm Oklahoma training turf at Saratoga in
1:02.40, while Grade 2-placed Casino Host, exiting a fifth in the Secretariat S.
(G1) on August 13 at Arlington, went four furlongs on Belmont’s fast training
track in :48.23.
Also on Sunday’s Saratoga worktab was Dell Ridge Farm’s sharp debut winner
FANTASTIC SONG (Lemon Drop Kid), who turned in a 1:01.40 five-furlong breeze on
the turf. Brown said that the two-year-old was “doing great” and confirmed his
status as a contender for next Sunday’s Pilgrim S. (G3) at 1 1/16 miles on the
grass.