SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Johannes, a finalist for the Eclipse Award in the male turf division in 2024, is scheduled to make his 2025 debut in the Grade 1, $750,000 Fourstardave Stakes at Saratoga on Aug. 2, trainer Tim Yakteen said Tuesday.
The Grade 1 status of the Fourstardave, a Win and You’re In race for the Breeders’ Cup Mile on Nov. 1 at Del Mar, made the Fourstardave the choice over this weekend’s Grade 2 Eddie Read Stakes at Del Mar, Yakteen said.
The Eddie Read was one of five graded stakes won by Johannes last year, a list that included the Grade 1 Shoemaker Mile at Santa Anita. The lone defeat suffered by Johannes was a three-quarter-length loss to More Than Looks in the Breeders’ Cup Mile.
Johannes ended his 4-year-old campaign with a three-quarters of a length victory in the Grade 2 San Gabriel at Santa Anita on Dec. 26. Johannes came out of that race with mild bone bruising, so he will be coming into the Fourstardave off a seven-month layoff. In 2024, Johannes won the Grade 3 American Stakes off an 11-month layoff.
“That was against a different group,” Yakteen said from Southern California. “We’re in a Grade 1, there are no easy Grade 1s. We’re running on a surface that we’ve never been on, going to a climate we really can’t say how he’s going to handle it. It’s 70 and breezy out here, I doubt we’re going to get that there.”
Johannes has 10 published workouts since May 19 and he will have one more at Del Mar before shipping to New York on July 29.
“In the mornings, he gives me the impression he’s fit and he’s ready to run his race,” Yakteen said. “Until you run him, you don’t know.”
Among those under consideration for the Fourstardave are Cugino, Deterministic, Lagynos, Neat, Spirit of St Louis, and either My Boy Prince or Win for the Money. Think Big is being considered, according to trainer Michael Stidham.
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