Chad Brown-trained favorites won the United Nations Stakes in 2021 and 2022. Winners of the other six renewals during the last eight years came home between 9-1 and 23-1.
The morning line pegs the Brown-trained Redistricting as the 7-2 favorite in this year’s Grade 2, $600,000 United Nations, a 1 3/8-mile grass race around three turns. Could be. Limited Liability is set at 4-1, Rebel Red 9-2, and seven of 12 entrants listed at 10-1 or lower – the kind of race where nobody knows anything.
No more than 11 will run, since Corruption will be scratched by Mark Casse in favor of an upcoming Saratoga allowance. Casse has a second entrant, Get Smokin, who led from start to finish and won the 2024 United Nations at 9-1. That was not Get Smokin’s first front-running surprise in a rich turf race. He earned about $1 million wiring the 2023 Kentucky Turf Cup at 20-1.
Eight-year-old Get Smokin returned from a winter break and finished third May 31 in the Eclipse, a 1 1/16-mile Tapeta race at Woodbine – the same race that served as a springboard to his U.N. win last July.
“Hard to say if he’s as good. You never really know. He’s a year older,” Casse said. “He’s coming up to the race good, his last race was good, and he should build from that.”
Fernando De La Cruz, the leading rider at Horseshoe Indianapolis, was aboard for Get Smokin’s two big wins, and he comes in for the ride. Few instructions are required. Get Smokin breaks from an outside post and goes for the lead.
“We have only one way to run,” Casse said.
Redistricting won for the first time since October 2023 while leading all the way June 14 in the Monmouth Stakes, a 1 1/8-mile contest beginning in the turf chute and going directly into a bend. Redistricting set a dawdling tempo at odds of 1-5, kicking clear for an easy score after a pair of tame sixth-place finishes to begin his 5-year-old campaign. He ended his 4-year-old season making a huge late run from last of 12 in the Seabiscuit at Del Mar, falling just short.
“He did it around three turns, showed us another dimension last time,” Brown said. “I think he’s still a work in progress. He has some two-turn races where he showed such a potent closing kick. I’m not married to either style for him, but I do think right now, this is the right race.”
Rebel Red, who lost his right eye last summer and thus prefers rallying outside, finally got a decent trip and won the $170,000 Chorleywood going 1 3/8 miles at Churchill Downs last month, getting his final three furlongs in a robust 34.66 seconds while drawing clear for a two-length victory over capable Highway Robber. In his previous start, Rebel Red clipped heels and fell. In April at Keeneland he dropped much too far behind a slow pace, and in his final start last year Rebel Red wound up in an unfamiliar position, leading.
“He’s trained forwardly out of his last race, and this is what we had circled for him,” said trainer Cherie DeVaux. “I think we found his distance, found his running style, and he actually seems like he’s getting better.”
Limited Liability has beaten Rebel Red the two times they have met and consistently turns in contending performances in races like the U.N., but he lacks a killer instinct. His lone victory in his last dozen starts came in the 2 1/16-mile Nashville Gold Cup last September.
Grand Sonata captured the $2 million Turf Cup at Kentucky Downs and missed Get Smokin by a nose in last year’s U.N. His most recent outing came on dirt after the Belmont Gold Cup was rained off turf, a poor showing there that is totally forgivable. Tawny Port, a head behind Grand Sonata in last year’s U.N., gets the same excuse from the same last race.
Major Dude makes his first start beyond nine furlongs and figures forwardly. Vote No and Starting Over are implausible, not impossible. Only Lord Eddard Stark and Hush of a Storm qualify as true longshots.
Hard to say whose flag flies over this year’s United Nations.
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