Beautiful Pleasure Looking for Third Personal Ensign

Beautiful Pleasure will go to the lead in Friday's grade I $400,000 Personal Ensign Handicap at Saratoga and a field of six young guns will be on her heels looking to stop her chance for a three-peat in the 1 1/4-mile event.

Beautiful Pleasure, a daughter of Maudlin-Beautiful Bid, by Baldski, was the older female champion of 1999. The big black mare has been a factor against some of the world's best horses since her juvenile campaign in 1997, but has stopped badly in both her races this year. She faded to finish fifth in the July 29 Go For Wand (gr. I) after opening up by 12 lengths down the backstretch, and in her seasonal debut, the June 23 Hempstead Handicap (gr. I), she finished a disappointing seventh.

Beautiful Pleasure, three-for-six on the Saratoga main track, drew the rail with regular rider Jorge Chavez in the irons. She was assigned 117, co highweight with Critical Eye, Irving's Baby, Pompeii, and SBeautiful Pleasure will go to the lead in Friday's grade I $400,000 Personal Ensign Handicap at Saratoga and a field of six young guns will be on her heels looking to stop her attempt for a three-peat in the 1 1/4-mile event.erra Lake.

Off her wins in the grade III Pimlico Distaff and the Go For Wand, Serra Lake is at the top of the class on east coast in the older female division. Bred and owned by Emory Hamilton, Serra Lake has won four of six starts this year. She finished sixth in the grade III Ladies Handicap, her only attempt at 10 furlongs. Edgar Prado will ride.

Robert Clay's Pompeii has taken giant steps forward over the last year, rising from the allowance ranks to grade I stakes places. A 4-year-old homebred by Broad Brush, Pompeii won the grade III Rate Treat and notched a third place finish in the grade III Affectionately, both at Aqueduct this winter. She most recently finished second, behind Serra Lake, in the Go For Wand.

The field for the grade I Personal Ensign includes: Beautiful Pleasure (Chavez, 117); Under the Rug (Gary Stevens, 115); Critical Eye (Jerry Bailey, 117); Catch the Ring (Pat Day, 115); Irving's Baby (John Velazquez, 117); Pompeii (Richard Migliore, 117); and Serra Lake (Prado, 117).