A two-time Breeders’ Cup champion returns to Keeneland for Friday’s Maker’s Mark Mile
A superstar from Ireland is the 3-5 morning-line favorite for Friday’s $600,000, Grade 1 Maker’s Mark Mile at Keeneland.
Modern Games, a 4-year-old bred and owned by Godolphin Racing, leads a field of eight in the 35th annual running, one of 10 races on the card in Lexington on Friday.
Modern Games will be racing Friday for the first time since winning the Breeders’ Cup Mile at Keeneland on Nov. 5 last year. Modern Games also won the 2021 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf at Del Mar and the Grade 1 Woodbine Mile Stakes last September. All three are Grade 1 races.
Modern Games, trained by Charles Appleby and ridden by William Buick, has won seven of his 13 career starts, with three runner-up finishes and total earnings of $3,176,716. His two Breeders’ Cup wins have been his only previous races in the United States.
“Horses like this don’t come along very often,” said Lorna Ford, who has been Modern Games’ regular exercise rider his entire career. “I didn’t know he’d become what he has, but he progressed rapidly.”
Second choice on the morning line for the Maker’s Mark Mile is Emmanuel (4-1). The Todd Pletcher trainee, who finished third in last year’s Toyota Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland, has won five of eight career races including his last two in a row — the Grade 3 Tampa Bay Stakes on Feb. 4 at Tampa Bay Downs and the Grade 3 Canadian Turf Stakes on March 4 at Gulfstream Park.
Chad Brown’s Dr Zempf (6-1) won his first start on American soil in an allowance race at Gulfstream on March 10. Before that, Dr Zempf ran nine races in England and won three.
Also in Friday’s field are Up to the Mark (10-1), Chez Pierre (12-1), Speaking Scout (15-1), Cabo Spirit (20-1) and In Love (30-1).
Half the field was bred internationally — Chez Pierre (France), Dr Zempf (Great Britain), In Love (Brazil) and Modern Games (Ireland) — with the rest bred in Kentucky.
First post at Keeneland on Friday is 1 p.m., with the Maker’s Mark Mile slated for a 5:16 p.m. post time (FanDuel TV).
▪ Wednesday’s racing at Keeneland was highlighted by the $120,000 Woods Edge Purse for fillies and mares. Irish-bred Flirting Bridge rocketed past longtime leader Sister Lou Ann inside the sixteenth pole to win the 1 1/16-mile race on turf by 1 1/4 lengths.
Sister Lou Ann finished second, 4 ¼ lengths in front of One Time Mo in third.
Winning jockey Tyler Gaffalione also won Wednesday’s two previous races back to back.
