Fox Hill Farm's Normandy Invasion is back in training following a brief setback due to a foot abscess, but no decision has been reached on a race target for the 3-year-old son of Tapit .
Trainer Chad Brown said the colt, who has not raced since finishing fourth in the May 4 Kentucky Derby Presented by Yum! Brands (gr. I), has been galloping for more than a week and could breeze around Aug. 7 at Saratoga Race Course. He missed several workouts because of the abscess in July, causing him to miss a run at the Aug. 24 Travers Stakes (gr. I).
"He's been galloping for over a week, but I am not sure of the timetable," said Brown. "After another week of galloping, I might let him breeze. Right now, I just want to get him to his first breeze and then go from there."
Hoof specialist Ian McKinlay was called in to work on the colt, who earlier in the season was runner-up to eventual William Hill Haskell Invitational (gr. I) winner Verrazano in the Wood Memorial Stakes (gr. I).
"Ian said the foot is going to grow out very well and he's very happy with the way it looks," owner Rick Porter of Fox Hill said. "Chad's been telling me that he's encouraged with the way Normandy Invasion is galloping; he's galloping better every day.
"But we're still going to talk in a week or so to decide whether we want to try to get him ready for the (Sept. 21) Pennsylvania Derby (gr. II) or not, because even if we got him ready for that race, he'd be going into it with five months between races.
"Depending on how he's training, we may adjust our thinking about what we're going to do with him the end of the year. We may just come up with a plan to get him ready to start his 4-year-old career. It all depends on how well he's galloping and how early Chad can get a breeze in him, so we're pretty much in a 'wait-and-see' situation. The Pennsylvania Derby isn't out at this point, but we're pretty much in a 'wait and see' situation at the moment."
Normandy Invasion, bred in Kentucky by Betz/Kidder/Gainesway/Graves/D.J. Stable/Cole is out of the Boston Harbor mare Boston Lady, and has a win and two seconds from six starts, with earnings of $400,240.
