SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – On the last day of the 2024 Belmont Stakes Festival, Spirit of St Louis romped in the Kingston Stakes, a race restricted to New York-breds. By that time, Spirit of St Louis already had risen to the top of the New York-bred turf route division.
One year later and Spirit of St Louis has soared far higher. In January at Gulfstream, he won the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Turf, then took down another Grade 1, the Old Forester Turf Classic on Derby Day at Churchill Downs. Now the 2024 Kingston winner is the 5-2 morning-line favorite for the Grade 1, $1 million Manhattan on Sunday.
The Manhattan was rescheduled to Sunday after torrential rains on Saturday left the turf course unsuitable for racing. The distance of the Manhattan was also changed, moving to 1 1/8 miles on the inner turf course.
Asked if he might have imagined a year ago that Spirit of St Louis, now 6, would hit a level this high, trainer Chad Brown answered succinctly: “No.”
Brown knows a Manhattan horse when he sees one. He won his first of eight Manhattans in 2012 and won every edition between 2019 and 2022. Brown began toying with the idea of moving Spirit of St Louis up in class late last summer.
“I did think going into the fall last year that he was a Grade 1 horse. That’s why I kind of over-entered him,” Brown said.
Brown’s talking about the Grade 1 Coolmore Turf Mile in October at Keeneland, where Spirit of St Louis, with a trip less than ideal, finished fifth. In retrospect, the distance of that race, not than the class level, might have proved his undoing.
With age, Spirit of St Louis has lost natural speed and gained strength and stamina. A mile once hit his sweet spot, and Spirit of St Louis often raced close to the pace. His two Grade 1s came over 1 1/8 miles; in both, Spirit of St Louis passed the stretch call in seventh before blitzing the finish.
Were the Manhattan contested over its usual 1 1/4 miles at Belmont Park, this might be a different story, but Saratoga’s course shapes more like Gulfstream and Churchill than Belmont, and the Manhattan here is now at a comfortable nine furlongs.
Not that he and jockey Manny Franco have much margin for error: The Pegasus win came by a neck, the Turf Classic by three-quarters. And among his eight rivals awaits a better horse, Far Bridge, than anyone Spirit of St Louis has beaten.
Far Bridge sits at 3-1 on the morning line, which might prove accurate, but by rights he should be favored. A winner in half his 16 starts, his bankroll stands at $2.1 million. And Far Bridge, a son of English Channel, whose offspring tend to develop later, could be poised for his best season at age 5.
“He’s been a good horse since Day 1,” trainer Miguel Clement said.
To hit his highest mark, Far Bridge might need 1 1/2 miles. He finished third in the 2024 Manhattan, won by the late Measured Time, but beat Measured Time in the 1 1/2-mile Sword Dancer. Far Bridge led in that race but has won from well off the pace.
“He’s very handy, he’s got tactical speed if you want to be closer, and he can have a great turn of foot if needed,” Clement said.
Far Bridge has gone 4 for 5 since Joel Rosario became his jockey. Rosario’s ride in the Breeders’ Cup Turf last fall, where Far Bridge finished ninth, wouldn’t win awards, but last month, in the Man o’ War over 1 3/8 miles at Aqueduct, Rosario slipped niftily up the fence before the half-mile pole after sitting third. Far Bridge beat a good horse, Anglophile, by one length and Rosario didn’t even wield his crop before showing Far Bridge the stick just before the finish.
Clement also sends out Deterministic and Carson’s Run, the former more than four lengths better than the latter in the Fort Marcy last month. Clement said Carson’s Run needed the race after a layoff, but Deterministic’s the better chance Sunday. Four-year-old Deterministic never had raced on the lead until his two starts this year and ran the race of his life in the 1 1/8-mile Fort Marcy, his first try as a turf pacesetter. Noted front-end rider Kendrick Carmouche getting a return call hints at Manhattan tactics, Clement said.
Deterministic’s chances took a hit when Corruption was rerouted from the Belmont Gold Cup to the Manhattan. Corruption set the pace and came within a neck of Far Bridge in the 1 1/2-mile Pan American in March, though that was a comeback race for Far Bridge, while Corruption made the fifth start of his form cycle.
“He doesn’t have to have the lead,” said trainer Mark Casse, “but his best races have come when he got it.”
Integration lost by a neck to Spirit of St Louis in the Pegasus, perhaps owing to a premature move, and his trip last month in the Turf Classic turned downright lousy. Not coincidentally, he gets a new rider Saturday, Flavien Prat, who rode Integration to his only win in his last six starts.
Highway Robber’s owners sent him to Dubai in February, an odd move that yielded one subpar performance and a quick trip back home to trainer Brian Lynch. Highway Robber, lightly raced and with a hint of upside at age 5, finished third in the Turf Classic last month and almost certainly wants more distance than that 1 1/8 miles.
Endlessly hasn’t won a turf race in a year and a half. Tucson has won three in a row but makes his stakes debut. They were bred in Kentucky, as was everyone else in the Manhattan – save the favorite, out of the New York-bred ranks, up to the top of the turf heap.
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