Crazy Mason could give Gregg Sacco his 1st Cigar Mile win

The Cigar Mile Handicap on Saturday might be the first of a lot of big lasts in the coming months at Aqueduct. The signature race of the fall meet will have its final run at the Big A before it moves with the rest of downstate racing to the new Belmont Park next fall.

“It’s bittersweet,” said trainer Gregg Sacco, who treks north from his winter base at Tampa Bay Downs to saddle Crazy Mason in the Grade 2, $500,000 race. “A new beginning at Belmont. So much tradition at Aqueduct. A lot of great memories there. Racing over the years, myself and shipping in from New Jersey with my dad in the past. It’s a prestigious race to win, and being the last one there has some significance, and it’s something to look back on. I hope we give a good account of ourselves on Saturday.”

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Sacco hopes to win the Cigar Mile for the first time on his first try. Five-time Eclipse Award-winning jockey Irad Ortiz Jr. hopes Crazy Mason gives him his first victory in the race, which he has lost 11 times. He never has been on the favorite, and Crazy Mason is the 7-2 third choice on the morning line.

“I think that’s about right,” Sacco said in a telephone interview on Horse Racing Nation’s Ron Flatter Racing Pod. “The two horses that are the one and two favorites (9-5 Phileas Fogg and 2-1 Bishops Bay), they have a little bit more on paper than us in in graded races and stake wins, but take nothing away from Crazy Mason.”

Drawn into post 4 in Saturday’s field of seven, Crazy Mason was assigned 124 pounds. Compare that with the high weights of 125 for Phileas Fogg and Bishops Bay, both of whom figure to show early speed. None of the other four entrants carries more than 120 pounds.

A 4-year-old son of Coal Front who is owned by Donna Wright and Reeves Thoroughbred Racing, Crazy Mason drew his higher impost in part because of his April 5 victory in the seven-furlong Carter (G2) at Aqueduct. Sacco said, though, that was not the colt’s most impressive performance. He was prouder of a troubled third this summer in the seven-furlong Forego (G1) at Saratoga. That was where Crazy Mason made up 10 1/4 lengths to make it close against the winner and would-be male-sprint champion Book’em Danno.

“He had to circle the field,” Sacco said. “He hit the gate that day. Beaten less than two lengths, he went about eight or nine wide. That was a very good race optically. He was rolling down the lane. Book’em Danno is Book’em Danno. To not break so great and circle the field against that level of competition, that may have been his best race without winning this year.”

Crazy Mason showed his trademark rally again Sept. 27 in the seven-furlong Vosburgh (G3) at Aqueduct, where he came from last place in the field of eight to finish second, 1 1/2 lengths behind Patriot Spirit.

“Really the pace didn’t materialize in that race like we thought it would,” Sacco said. “We gave him a little breather after that. Pointing for this race, we skipped the (Nov. 2) Forty Niner (G3), and he’s worked very well coming into the race.”

Phileas Fogg cuts back Saturday from two-turn races, and Bishops Bay, who won the Forty Niner, is 3-for-3 going a mile. Crazy Mason has not raced beyond sprint distances since he was third in the 2024 Long Branch going a mile and 70 yards at Monmouth Park.

“We did (routes) early in his career,” Sacco said. “We went on the Derby trail as a 3-year-old when he won a two-turn allowance race at Tampa. Things didn’t materialize, but he has definitely matured into a different horse since then.”

If the big rallies in Crazy Mason’s last two races translate into a strong performance Saturday, Sacco said, more routes could be in his future as a 5-year-old.

“Listen, it’s not out of the question,” he said. “He had run so well sprinting that we stuck to the plan this year. It’s not out of the question moving forward next year. But the one-turn mile we’re really looking forward to on Saturday because he’s given us every indication that he should be powerful coming down the lane the extra eighth of a mile.”

Crazy Mason will do so for the first time with Ortiz, who will be the colt’s ninth different rider in a career that has yielded $524,470 from a 17: 5-3-4 record. The new combination could fill open spaces on the résumés of the jockey and trainer if the early pace is hot enough.

“That would be good,” Sacco said. “Bishops Bay’s record is impeccable. He’s coming in with his (three Grade 3 wins). Phileas Fogg, he’s had an outstanding year. Those are two top horses we’re going to have to run down. We expect them to be in front of us. We hope there’s some pace on the inside, maybe Mika. If there’s an honest pace, we’ll probably be seeing the field, and we’re going to have to come get them in the lane.”

While Sacco, 59, winters in Florida, his son Will, 25, looks after the stable’s New York-based horses and carries on the legacy of a racing family. Rick Sacco, Gregg’s brother, is a former trainer who runs Red Oak Farm in Florida. Bill Sacco, their late father and Will’s grandfather, was a longtime trainer in New Jersey.

“(Will) is third generation,” Gregg Sacco said. “It’s nice to see him so involved and so passionate about the sport. I look for big things from Will when he goes on his own in the future. But for right now, I’m happy he’s on board with me.”