Idiomatic, Randomized will meet again in Personal Ensign

Eclipse Award winner Idiomatic drew post 4, and her archrival Randomized got the outside draw in the field of five Friday for the Grade 1, $500,000 Personal Ensign Stakes, a 1 1/8-mile race for older fillies and mares at Saratoga.

Idiomatic won the Personal Ensign last year by four lengths, part of a six-race winning streak that carried through early this year. Along the way she clinched the 2023 championship for older dirt females when she won the Breeders’ Cup Distaff at Santa Anita.

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That victory in California came at the expense of Randomized, who got even June 8 when she took advantage of Idiomatic’s poor start and beat her by a head June 8 in the Ogden Phipps (G1), a race that was run over the same course and distance as they will see again in the Personal Ensign.

A 5-year-old Juddmonte homebred daughter of Curlin who is trained by Brad Cox, Idiomatic is coming off her win by a head in the Molly Pitcher (G3) on July 20 at Monmouth Park, a surprisingly close call for a 1-10 favorite. She will have her usual jockey Florent Géroux as she tries to add to her $3,476,840 in earnings.

Randomized, a 4-year-old Nyquist filly who is trained by Chad Brown, is racing for the first time since the Phipps. Before that she was a beaten, odds-on favorite in the Ruffian (G2) at Aqueduct. With $1,258,350 in earnings for Klaravich Stables, Randomized will be ridden for the second time in a row by Joel Rosario.

Brown also entered three-time graded-stakes winner Raging Sea, a 4-year-old who finished first in the Shuvee (G2) on July 21 at Saratoga after coming in a tired fourth in the Phipps. Flavien Prat will ride her from post 3.

Xigera, a two-time graded-stakes-winning 4-year-old, tries to bounce back from her troubled fifth in the Fleur de Lis (G2) when she starts from post 1. Soul of an Angel, the 5-year-old who gave Idiomatic her scare in the Molly Pitcher, goes from post 2.

The Personal Ensign on Friday at 5:43 p.m. EDT will be the 10th of 12 races at Saratoga. The first post is scheduled for 12:35 p.m. EDT.