Keeneland: Perryville, Raven Run feature 3-year-old sprinters

St. Elias Stable’s Captain Cook, the morning line favorite for Saturday’s 17th running of the Grade 3, $350,000 Perryville, arrived at Keeneland Wednesday from Saratoga and galloped once around early on the main track Thursday morning.

“We got him in the barn a month before he ran (in the Grade 1 H. Allen Jerkens Memorial),” said Sophie Green, who is overseeing trainer Todd Pletcher’s Keeneland string and was at Saratoga when Captain Cook joined the stable.

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“I really like him. He’s one of my favorites,” Green said. “He is very chill and relaxed.”

Captain Cook was caught at the wire by Patch Adams losing by a nose in the Jerkens but finishing 1 1/2 lengths ahead of Perryville rival Barnes.

“We didn’t know if the (seven-furlong) distance would suit him,” Green said of Captain Cook, who was making only his second sprint start of 2025.

Pletcher, who leads all trainers with 75 stakes victories at Keeneland, will be going for his second win in the Perryville and fourth stakes victory of the fall meet. Irad Ortiz Jr. has the mount Saturday.

One of the leading players early this year on the road to the Kentucky Derby, Owen Almighty is another top contender for the Perryville.

“He will come over Friday (from Churchill Downs) and then school in the paddock,” trainer Brian Lynch said of Owen Almighty, whose lone Keeneland start was a sixth-place finish in the Blue Grass Stakes (G1) in April. Lynch trains Owen Almighty for Flying Dutchmen.

Following the Blue Grass, Owen Almighty outran his 40-1 odds in the Kentucky Derby by leading the 19-horse field into the stretch before finishing fifth behind Sovereignty.

Given time off after the Kentucky Derby, Owen Almighty resurfaced at Charles Town on Aug. 22 for the seven-furlong Robert Hilton Memorial. He finished last of eight after being eased as the favorite.

“I don’t know what happened,” Lynch said. “It is a modern mystery. They ought to put it on Dateline.”

Owen Almighty has had five works at Churchill Downs since the Charles Town race “and he has been training well and doing well,” Lynch said. “This race was the plan.”

The Perryville drew some top-flight talent, including graded stakes winners Barnes and Gaming for trainer Bob Baffert and Captain Cook, who just missed by a nose in his most recent start in the H. Allen Jerkens Memorial (G1) at Saratoga for trainer Todd Pletcher.

California-based Om N Joy bypasses Breeders' Cup for Raven Run

There was talk, albeit briefly, of a possible Breeders’ Cup run for Om N Joy after she won the Torrey Pines (G3) at Del Mar on Aug. 30.

Instead of staying in California, Om N Joy will have her version of the Breeders’ Cup at Keeneland on Saturday in the $400,000 Raven Run (G2) for 3-year-old fillies going seven furlongs.

“We are going to enjoy the trip, and it will be a celebration of the year,” trainer Aggie Ordoñez said Wednesday of Om N Joy, who will be racing outside of California for the first time in her career. “She has earned the right to give it a try.”

Owned by Connie Baker, Jerry Baker, Michael Golovko and Terrance Scanlon, Om N Joy arrived at Keeneland on Tuesday. She walked the shed row this morning with an initial trip to the main track slated for Thursday morning.

“She beat me here,” said Ordonez, who is making her first visit to Keeneland. “She had a direct flight, and I had to go through Dallas.”

Om N Joy has won her past five races beginning with a maiden victory at Santa Anita in March. Three consecutive stakes victories over California-breds followed. She took the Torrey Pines over open company.

Kent Desormeaux has been aboard for the past four victories and will have the mount Saturday.

“Kent has been a big part of it,” Ordoñez said of the filly’s win streak. “It’s like having my own personal hall of famer.”

Ordoñez’s father is Pete Anderson, a leading east coast jockey in the 1940s through the 1970s and a former trainer.