Nearly two decades after winning with a relatively unknown horse that would go on to greater glory, trainer Michael Matz brings another talented maiden winner to Laurel Park in search of stakes success in Saturday's $150,000 Laurel Futurity.
Matz will saddle Runnymoore Racing homebred Understudy Kitty in the 97th running of the Futurity for 2-year-olds, co-headliner with the $150,000 Selima for 2-year-old fillies on an 11-race program featuring four stakes worth $500,000 in purses. Both juvenile races are scheduled for 1 1/16 miles on the grass.
The opening Saturday card of the calendar year-ending fall meet also includes the $100,000 Japan Turf Cup for 3-year-olds and up scheduled for 1 ½ miles on the grass and the $100,000 Twixt for fillies and mares 3 and older going 1 1/16 miles on the main track.
First race post time is 12:25 p.m.
Fresh off a debut triumph at Delaware Park, Barbaro came to Laurel in late fall of 2005 to earn his first stakes victory in the Futurity, run on the undercard of the Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash, then a Grade 1. He would race one more time on turf, capturing Calder's Tropical Park Derby (G3) to open his 3-year-old season, and reeled off wins in the Holy Bull (G2) and Florida Derby (G1) at Gulfstream Park and Kentucky Derby (G1) before suffering a leg injury in the Preakness (G1).
The thought of Barbaro's Futurity win brings back fond memories for Matz, who had run only one other horse in the race since, finishing seventh with Lake Placid in 2007.
“It sure does,” Matz said. “It seems like it's been ages to look for another one. I know I'll never find one, but we'll just keep looking for one.”
Like Barbaro, Understudy Kitty enters the Futurity off a maiden victory, though in his second start. Fourth as the favorite in his Aug. 19 debut, the Kitten's Joy colt returned in the same spot with a gutsy front-running neck triumph sprinting 5 ½ furlongs over the Colonial Downs turf Sept. 8.
“The first time we ran him he just got a little green on us, so I think [jockey Jorge] Ruiz wanted to make sure he got him out of the gate and got him into the contest, which I don't think that's really his style of running,” Matz said. “I don't know that he wants to be on the lead and doing that, but I think he has enough ability that he got it done.
“I think the running style that he has, I think he'll break and hopefully sit mid-pack and make a nice move down the lane,” he added. “His disposition is good enough. I think he just kind of did that on sheer ability.”
Understudy Kitty had a maintenance half-mile breeze in 51 seconds over the all-weather surface at the Fair Hill Training Center in Elkton, Md. Monday. Jeiron Barbosa, fresh off his title at Pimlico Race Course's boutique fall meet, is named to ride from Post 4 in a field of 16 that includes main-track-only entrants Thedingoateyobaby and Bolt of Aurum.
“It's a little quick to come back, but he came out of the race real well. He's got a very, very good disposition, so we're hoping that he can step up to the task,” Matz said. “It's a big jump going from a maiden 5 ½ to the Laurel Futurity, but I think he's nice enough or we wouldn't be trying it.”
Mark Grier's Air Recruit will also be stretching out around two turns off a pair of 5 ½-furlong turf sprints at Colonial. The Air Force Blue colt settled off the pace before coming with a determined run to win his debut by 1 ¼ lengths Aug. 5, then finished third to multiple stakes winner No Nay Mets in the Sept. 9 Rosie's.
“I thought he ran well the last time,” trainer Arnaud Delacour said. “We were trying the stakes level. The winner might be one of the best 2-year-old sprinters in the country so far, so it was pretty hard to catch up with him. But I thought he gave a good account of himself and it looks like he could appreciate a little more distance.”
Air Force Blue was a multiple Group 1 winner on turf in Europe sprinting six and seven furlongs. Charlie Marquez returns to ride for the third straight race, breaking from Post 9.
“I think he's mature enough now and he's got enough experience that we can try a little bit longer,” Delacour said. “I think he'll be forwardly placed, but we've been breezing him behind horses in the morning and he's been very relaxed about it. I'm looking forward to seeing him perform at that distance.”
Respect the Valleys homebred Massif finished ninth in the 1 1/16-mile Kitten's Joy Sept. 9 after running second in his July 14 debut going 5 ½ furlongs and cruising to a 7 ¼-length triumph when stretched out to a mile Aug. 5. All three races came under Jevian Toledo at Colonial.
“The first time we ran him we sprinted him, and we never really thought he was a sprinter but we needed to get him going. He ran a credible race, and he looked really good when he won going two turns,” Maryland's leading trainer, Brittany Russell, said. “That's the horse we kind of were hoping to see.
“Last time, we don't really know,” she added. “I feel like it was such a dull race that he deserves another try. He trains good and he's a decent horse, and it's one of those things where our opportunities are going to be limited going two turns on the grass into the fall locally, so I feel like he deserves another chance.”
Russell's husband, jockey Sheldon Russell, has the riding assignment from Post 7.
“I don't think Toledo gave him a bad trip at all. He's a big horse,” Brittany Russell said. “Maybe he just needs a little bit of a different trip. I think we just kind of want to cross that one off, give it another go and hopefully we see a better horse this time.”
The Futurity drew several out-of-town trainers including previous winners George Weaver and Mike Maker from New York and Joe Sharp from Kentucky. Weaver, who won in 2014 with Cyclogenesis, sends in R.A. Hill Stable and SGV Thoroughbreds' Dancing Mischief, who romped by seven lengths in an off-the-turf maiden special weight going one mile Aug. 18 at Saratoga. The race came 13 days after he was second by less than a length despite a troubled trip in a 1 1/16-mile spot on the grass.
Maker won with Catman in 2020 a year after finishing fourth with Field Pass, who would go on to win eight stakes, five graded, and more than $1.2 million in purse earnings. He is represented by Three Diamonds Farm's Skellig Island, a one-mile maiden claiming winner July 27 at Colonial that exits an 11th-place finish in the Kitten's Joy.
West Bloodstock's Edgartown, a Quality Road colt trained by Sharp, is making just his second start in the Futurity. After rating between horses in his debut, a seven-furlong sprint Sept. 2 at Kentucky Downs, he forged a short lead at the top of the stretch but encountered trouble and wound up second, beaten 2 ½ lengths.
Also entered are Elevated Game, a 7 ¼-length debut winner sprinting on the grass Aug. 27 at Canterbury Park; Blame the Tux, a 1 ¼-length maiden claiming winner Aug. 25 at Colonial; Tropandhagen, a four-length maiden special weight winner on the Monmouth Park turf Sept. 3; Blue Creek, Grand Kingdom, Mortal Sin, Sasse's Class and Wine Collector.
The Laurel Futurity has a rich history dating back to 1921 inaugural winner Morvich, who would go on to win the 1922 Kentucky Derby. The Futurity has also been won by Triple Crown champions Affirmed, Citation, Count Fleet and Secretariat along with such horses as In Reality, Honest Pleasure, Quadrangle, Riva Ridge, Spectacular Bid and Tapit.
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