Aye Eye

The GI Spendthrift Farm Hopeful Stakes is carded as the anchor for Monday's Labor Day festivities, which marks the last set of races for the season upstate. A scan through the past winners of the top-level affair over the past 25 years include a strong list of future sires. How about for starters Sky Mesa (2002), First Samurai (2005), Shanghai Bobby (2012) and Competitive Edge (2014)? More recently Practical Joke (2016), Mind Control (2018), Basin (2019), Jackie's Warrior (2020), Gunite (2021) and Forte (2022) got their picture taken before heading...

6th-Saratoga, $80,000, (R), Msw, 8-8, 2yo, 6f, 1:12.64, ft, 1 1/2 lengths. AYE EYE (c, 2, Essential Quality--Divine Queen {MSW, $339,344}, by Divine Park) might have touched 500-1 if there were in-play wagering on American racing, but turned in a rally for the ages to graduate going away at first asking. Dismissed as the longest shot on the board ad 26-1, the gray colt walked out of the gate and at the end of the first two furlongs, was nearly 20 lengths behind pacesetting favorite Escape Hall (Independence Hall). Still...