On Saturday at Aqueduct, the featured race is the 29th running of the $100,000 Garland of Roses Stakes. The race will be run on the inner track at six furlongs and has drawn a field of eight fillies and mares.
Willet has been tabbed as the morning line favorite at 5-2 and is wheeling back after running in the Go For Wand (G3) on November 28. A six-year-old daughter of Jump Start trained by James Iselin, she has won eight times and is a multiple stakes winner. She has been on the board in five of her six starts this year with the lone blemish coming with a seventh-place finish last time out. Angel Arroyo will be aboard from post position six.
Second choice at 3-1 on the morning line is Winning Image, a former New England champion trained by Michael Aro. The seven-year-old mare is cross-entered for a stakes race at Laurel on Saturday as well. She has fourteen career victories to her credit, three of which have come this year. She went gate to wire to take the Cornucopia Stakes last time out at Parx and has worked a bullet since that last race. Anthony Black will be in the irons from post four.
Also in the field as a coupled entry at odds of 7-2 are Bridgehampton and Jonata, both trained by Michael Hushion and owned by Barry Schwartz. Bridgehampton, winner of three of her eight starts, will be making her first start since finishing sixth and last in the Gallant Bloom (G2) in September and will have Jose Ortiz aboard. Jonata will be making the first stakes appearance of her fourteen-race career and will be carrying Dylan Davis.
The field is set for the $1 million Haskell, where Nyquist will be trying to re-stake his claim as the top three-year-old in the country.
On Sunday at Monmouth Park, the featured race is the $300,000 United Nations Stakes. Scheduled to be run at a mile and three-eighths on the turf, the Grade 1 event has drawn a field of ten colts and geldings.
On Sunday at Monmouth Park, the featured race is the $150,000 Pegasus Stakes, a key prep race for the Haskell Invitational (G1). The Grade 3 event will be contested at a mile and a sixteenth and has drawn a field of seven three-year-olds.
With five grade 1 races and a grade 2, the undercard for the June 11 Belmont stakes could be the best single day of racing on the calendar outside of the Breeders’ Cup.
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