Grade 3 winner Sunny Ridge returns to Monmouth Park May 26 for the $100,000 Salvator Mile Stakes (G3), where the New Jersey-bred has fared well.
In his juvenile season of 2015, Dennis Drazin's son of Holy Bull won his maiden-claiming debut and the Sapling Stakes at Monmouth. The following year he finished third to Exaggerator in the betfair.com Haskell Invitational Stakes (G1).
The Salvator Mile will mark Sunny Ridge's first start at Monmouth since the 2016 Haskell, and the gelding has continued to put together a solid racing career. Last year he won the Jazil and Stymie stakes at Aqueduct Racetrack and finished second in the Brooklyn Invitational Stakes (G2) at Belmont Park.
Trained by Jason Servis, Sunny Ridge will be making the second start of his 5-year-old season in the Salvator Mile, which has drawn seven entries. He enters the two-turn test off a runner-up finish in an optional-claiming allowance race April 20 at Aqueduct.
The Salvator Mile is the first race in the 3-year-olds and older in the long-dirt division of the Mid-Atlantic Thoroughbred Championship Series.
After delivering a promising run on dirt in the Ben Ali Stakes (G3) April 14 at Keeenland, Derrick Smith's Chip Leader will stay on dirt for the Salvator Mile. The son of Giant's Causeway who has made 17 of his 21 career starts on turf or synthetic surfaces led into the stretch of the 1 1/8-mile Ben Ali before fading to second.
The field also includes Shaft of Light, who enters off a win in the Russell Road Stakes April 21 at Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races for trainer Jorge Navarro; and veteran grade 3 winner Page McKenney, who will try for the 14th stakes win of his career.
Monmouth Park, Saturday, May 26, 2018, Race 11Entries: Salvator Mile S. (G3)
PP Horse Jockey Wgt Trainer M/L 1 1Papa Zulu (KY) Carol Cedeno 117 Kelly Rubley 20/1 2 2Shaft of Light (ON) Jose C. Ferrer 117 Jorge Navarro 3/1 3 3Sunny Ridge (NJ) Paco Lopez 117 Jason Servis 5/2 4 4Chip Leader (KY) Jose L. Ortiz 117 Todd A. Pletcher 3/1 5 5Indian Guide (ON) Trevor McCarthy 117 Mario Serey, Jr. 15/1 6 6Page McKenney (PA) Horacio Karamanos 117 Mary E. Eppler 7/2 7 7Great Stuff (KY) Joe Bravo 121 David Jacobson 9/2
