Chide, Pleasant Tales Breeze for Dogwood

Claiborne Farm and Adele Dilschneider’s Chide breezed a half-mile in :48.80 Sunday morning after the renovation break in preparation for Saturday night’s 40th running of the $100,000 Dogwood – the feature event on an 11-race Downs After Dark night racing card that begins at 6 p.m. ET.

 

“She went super,” exercise rider Scott Orm said. “There was no stress, she was nice and relaxed. I couldn’t have asked for a better work. She’s just the same filly she’s always been. She does everything easy in the morning, she doesn’t waste herself; saves it all for the evening. We’re happy with her.”

 

“Everything went fine,” trainer Al Stall Jr. said. “We wanted to go :49 and we ended up going :48 and change. She worked in company with Dating Lady Luck who is going in the Dueling Grounds Oaks at Kentucky Downs so it looked like a nice set.”

 

The 3-year-old daughter of Blame was fifth beaten 7 ¼ lengths in the Coaching Club American Oaks (GI) at Saratoga on July 26. Stall stated that the Dogwood would be a good chance for his filly to take a cut back in distance.

 

“We just want to shorten her up,” he said. “Her mother [Yell] was much more effective around one turn and we tried nine furlongs on two turns around Saratoga and she was kind of even around there. She ran a pretty good race around turn at Belmont in the Mother Goose, just strictly for the turn back and she fits in the race like that.”

 

Chide, a homebred, will be seeking her first victory against stakes company. Aside from a fifth in the Coaching Club American Oaks, she ran third beaten 3 ¾ lengths in the Mother Goose (GI) at Belmont Park. In five career starts, she has two wins on her résumé; a maiden victory at Oaklawn and an allowance at Churchill Downs. Jockey Shaun Bridgmohan, the pilot in both victories, will have the mount in the Dogwood.

 

Another probable for the Dogwood is Charles Fipke’s Pleasant Tales, who worked a bullet half mile in :47.40 Sunday. The daughter of Tale of Ekati worked in company with her stable mate Tale of Verve for trainer Dallas Stewart. She was last seen running a well-beaten ninth in the Test (GI) at Saratoga.

 

“She [Pleasant Tales] ran well in the Mother Goose and ran bad in the Test,” Stewart said. “She’s been training real well since then though. They both looked good and came back real well.”

 

Tale of Verve, last seen finishing a well-beaten eighth in the Travers (GI) at Saratoga, is being pointed towards a start in the $400,000 Oklahoma Derby (GIII) on Sept. 27 at Remington Park.