Take Charge Brandi On Comeback Trail
Willis Horton’s Champion Two-Year-Old Filly Take Charge Brandi galloped on the main track Friday morning for Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas. A non-displaced bone chip in her right knee was found before last year’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies winner was scheduled to start in the Rebel (GII) in March at Oaklawn, which forced her to miss 60 days of training.
“She’s doing fine,” Lukas said. “We’ve got a routine getting her fit and everything but were just moving her along to get her fit enough for some serious works.”
Lukas is targeting the $500,000 Test (GI) on Aug. 8 at Saratoga for Take Charge Brandi’s return. The daughter of Giant’s Causeway last raced when she won the Martha Washington at Oaklawn on Jan. 31.
“We’d like to make the Test, it’s on our radar,” Lukas said. “It’d be a nice starting point. It’s a Grade I and it’s seven-eighths (of a mile). She’s filled out and she really looks good right now. It’s just like with American Pharoah, sometimes they get hurt but it helps them in the long run.”
Also for Lukas, Calumet Farm’s Mr. Z will run in the $500,000 Ohio Derby at Thistledown on June 20.
“He’s such a tough horse,” Lukas said. “People say he’s raced a lot but hell, he really wants to train and he’s dragging us around.”
Lukas likes the race for the son of Malibu Moon mainly because of the distance.
“This is a good spot for him, it’s a mile-and-a-sixteenth,” Lukas said. “I think he’s going be a real top miler by the fall. I want to try him on the grass. He can get a mile-and-sixteenth and a mile-and-an-eighth, but I think that a flat mile is his preferred distance.”
Source: Churchill Downs