On paper, multiple grade 1 winner Mind Your Biscuits' five-furlong breeze in 1:00.45 under regular rider Joel Rosario was one of the best over the Saratoga Race Course's main track Aug. 11, ranking third-fastest of 18 horses.
Mind Your Biscuits, in company with Rock Nation, went in splits of :24 1/5 and :37 1/5, and galloped out to six furlongs in 1:14 2/5, according to NYRA clockers.
Trainer Chad Summers, however, was left wanting more from the multi-millionaire son of Posse he co-owns with his father and brother along with J Stables, Head of Plains Partners, and Michael Kisber.
"It was OK. I don't think it was the best work we've ever seen from him," Summers said. "It was the work that I thought, unfortunately, that we were going to get. He's going to end up with (close to) a bullet work, and I'm disappointed.
"He came home the last quarter in :23. To anybody else, they'd probably say it was a good work ... but knowing the horse the way we know him, I'm not happy," he added. "To beat the caliber of field ... with Drefong and Tommy Macho and those horses, you've got to bring your 'A' game and he didn't bring it today."
Under the guidance of previous trainer Robert Falcone Jr., Mind Your Biscuits won the Amsterdam Stakes (G2) and Malibu Stakes (G1) last year as a 3-year-old. This season, he gave Summers his first win as a trainer in the Dubai Golden Shaheen Sponsored By Gulf News (G1) March 25 at Meydan Racecourse and followed up with a victory in the grade 2 Belmont Sprint Championship Stakes July 8 at Belmont Park.
Summers felt Mind Your Biscuits has been affected by road traffic and music from local establishments near his stall and was not thriving as much as he would like at Saratoga. Friday was the chestnut colt's third local work following half-mile breezes in :50.55 July 28 and :49.09 Aug. 3.
The Forego Stakes (G1) at Saratoga and the Pat O'Brien Stakes (G2) at Del Mar, both run at seven furlongs Aug. 26, and both Win and You're In qualifiers for the Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile (G1), are among the next-race options for Mind Your Biscuits.
"It throws everything up in the air," Summers said. "At this point now we're just going to sit here, sleep with him tonight, and figure it out. The Forego is a possibility. The Pat O'Brien goes back on the radar. There's a plane that leaves Sunday to go to California. Skipping both races entirely and waiting for something else is also a possibility.
"He had shown all the signs that this was going to happen today, and it happened. I'm not going to commit to anything at this point. We'll just kind of see what happens. I'd say we're 50-50 at best."