Stall's Alternative Route takes unique path to Queen's Plate

Alternative Route certainly has lived up to his name, as his final prep for Saturday's Queen’s Plate at Woodbine came in the Grade 3 Arlington Classic over 1 1 /16 miles of turf.

Trainer Al Stall Jr. had started Alternative Route on the road to Saturday’s $1 million Queen’s Plate on March 17, watching the Tiznow colt win Turfway Park’s 1 1/16-mile Rushaway Stakes in his synthetic debut. 

“After that I struggled to find a (Queen’s Plate) prep for him,” said Stall. “I looked at the Plate Trial but I didn’t want to bring him up there, and back, with just three weeks between races. And, I wasn’t comfortable leaving him up there, either.”

So, Stall, who trains Alternative Route for Spendthrift Farm and Town and Country Racing LLC, opted to choose a fork in the road which led to Illinois and an unexpected yielding turf course on May 26.

“They’d taken all the other races off the turf that day,” said Stall, who will be visiting Toronto for the first time.  “The turf was a bog that day. The kid (jockey Mitchell Murrill) said the horse could barely stand up on it. But, he still finished fourth.

“In a perfect world they would have taken it off the turf, and he would have had his prep on Polytrack.”

Alternative Route also was making his first start in blinkers in the Arlington race and will retain the equipment for the Queen’s Plate.

“It’s tough to put blinkers on, after a win,” said Stall. “But he was very green in the Rushaway; he was literally shying away from everything. His ears were straight forward, the whole way. But, he certainly took to the Poly.”

Alternative Route has been training on a synthetic surface at the Skylight Training Center in Louisville with his latest move a four-furlong breeze in :49 last Saturday.

And, Stall also takes heart in the fact that the $265,000 yearling purchase is a full brother to Enstone, a multiple stakes winner who was based here with trainer Mark Casse. “She had great Woodbine form, on turf and Poly,” said Stall.