Untapable, Stopchargingmaria Set to Do Battle in Shuvee

Eclipse Award winner Untapable and Stopchargingmaria, a finalist in the 3-year-old division last year, will meet for the first time Sunday at Saratoga Race Course as they head a field of six fillies and mares in the Grade 3, $200,000 Shuvee Handicap.

 

Untapable, who was a unanimous choice for champion 3-year-old filly after suffering only one loss - against the boys in the Grade 1 Haskell Invitational - in seven starts, will be making her Spa debut in the 1 1/8-mile Shuvee, in which she has been assigned high weight of 123 pounds. Owned by Ron Winchell, the Tapit filly has won one of three races as a 4-year-old, taking the Grade 1 Apple Blossom Handicap at Oaklawn Park, along with runner-up finishes in the Grade 1 Ogden Phipps at Belmont Park and the Grade 2 Azeri, also at Oaklawn.

 

Hall of Famer John Velazquez will be aboard Untapable when she leaves from post position 4, giving from three to nine pounds to her five rivals.

 

Stopchargingmaria, who will tote 120 pounds including Javier Castellano from post position 5, is 3-1-0 from four starts at Saratoga. The Tale of the Cat filly broke her maiden at first asking in 2013, returned to finish second in the Grade 1 Spinaway to Sweet Reason, and the following year put together back-to-back victories in the Grade 1 Coaching Club American Oaks and the Alabama. Most recently she won the Grade 3 Allaire du Pont Distaff at Pimlico Race Course.

 

"She's doing well," reported Todd Pletcher, who trains Stopchargingmaria for Town and Country Farms. "We're very happy with her and her last breeze [a bullet half-mile in 47.03 on Sunday]. She seems to be in good form. We were planning on running her in the Ogden Phipps but she got a little sick before the race. Her two biggest wins have been here, and she's 3-for-4 here and was second in another start. She seems to enjoy Saratoga."

 

Hall of Fame trainer Carl Nafzger will be saddling his first starter at Saratoga since 2013 and only the second since 2011 when he sends out Jim Tafel's Tiz Windy, most recently third in the Grade 3 Fleur de Lis at Churchill Downs. Nafzger, who saddled Unbridled to victory in the 1990 Kentucky Derby and Street Sense to win the Run for the Roses 17 years later, has been semi-retired for some years, but enjoyed one of his greatest summers in  2007, when Street Sense won the Grade 2 Jim Dandy and Grade 1 Travers and Lady Joanne took the Banshee Breeze and the Alabama.

 

Tiz Windy, one of a handful of horses he trains for longtime client Tafel, won the Grade 2 Indiana Oaks in 2014, but has yet to find the winner's circle as a 4-year-old. Prior to the Fleur de Lis, the Tiznow filly was fourth, beaten less than two lengths, in the Grade 1 La Troienne at Churchill and also was a close-up fifth in the Grade 3 Doubledogdare at Keeneland.

 

"She runs hard every race," said Nafzger. "In my opinion she always run well, and has never had a bad race."

 

Julien Leparoux will ride Tiz Windy from post position 6 under 117 pounds.

 

Joining the fray as well will be Joseph Shields' consistent House Rules, no worse than third in six stakes starts this year including victories in the Grade 3 Top Flight Handicap at Aqueduct Racetrack and the Grade 3 Rampart and Belle Harbour, both at Gulfstream.

 

Carrying 118 pounds including Junior Alvarado, House Rules will leave from post position 3.