Sushi Man, who remained unbeaten on turf with his win in the Canterbury Park Derby, has a long-range goal of making the $150,000 Hawthorne Derby, trainer Coty Rosin said Thursday. But before the Oct. 5 turf race, Sushi Man has another stakes opportunity at home at Canterbury. Rosin said Sushi Man is being pointed toward the $75,000 Minnesota Derby on dirt, the richest stakes of the meet along with the Minnesota Oaks.
“Because he’s a Minnesota-bred, he’s actually going to go back to dirt for the Minnesota Derby on Aug. 9,” Rosin said. “It’s a great race for the breeders and owners, and if he could be a two-time derby winner over the summer, that would be pretty cool. From there, we’ve kind of got our sights on the Hawthorne Derby. Hopefully, we’ll be able to just keep him on the turf moving forward after this next race.”
Sushi Man ran second in a pair of maiden races on dirt before breaking through in his turf debut June 11 at Canterbury. He rolled by 7 1/4 lengths in a maiden special weight around two turns, then backed up the win with a 9 1/4-length victory in the June 28 Canterbury Derby. For the stakes win, he earned a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 80.
“I thought it was pretty impressive,” Rosin said. “To do what he did, just in a couple of starts, to go from a maiden win to a stakes win, that’s not always easy to do. And the way he did it, and beat what looks like a few decent horses in there, I thought it was very encouraging.”
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