Baby Yoda Given Green Light for Cigar Mile

Owner Adam Wachtel reported that seven-time winner and multiple graded stakes placed Baby Yoda  will pursue his first stakes triumph in the Dec. 3 $750,000 Cigar Mile Handicap presented by NYRA Bets (G1) at Aqueduct Racetrack.

Running for the partnership of Wachtel Stable, Gary Barber, and Pantofel Stable and trained by Bill Mott, Baby Yoda was most recently a close second as the favorite in the Oct. 29 Kelso Handicap (G2). He set a moderate tempo on the backstretch before being passed up by upset winner and probable returning rival Double Crown  inside the sixteenth pole.

A four-time winner of eight starts this season, the 4-year-old Prospective  gelding defeated starter-allowance company going six furlongs twice in Kentucky at the beginning of the year before securing allowance optional-claiming scores on the NYRA circuit going seven furlongs and a one-turn mile, respectively. He was a narrowly-beaten second in the Pelican Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs in his 2022 debut and was a distant second to Flightline   in last year’s Runhappy Malibu Stakes (G1) at Santa Anita Park.

“He’s a little bit of a folk hero, but he’s never won a stakes race,” Wachtel said. “He’s come close a couple times, he finished second to Flightline in the Malibu. I would hope that we get some weight from some of these others. But so far, that’s the plan. If he comes out of yesterday’s work in good shape, we’ll be there next Saturday.”

Baby Yoda is most well-known for recording a 112 Equibase Speed Figure at the allowance level last September at Saratoga Race Course, defeating eventual grade 1-winning stablemate Olympiad   by 4 1/4 lengths going 6 1/2 furlongs.

“That was quite something. I came up that day on a last minute trip and I knew he was training well and I knew how good Olympiad was,” Wachtel recalled. “That was quite the extraordinary effort. The next morning, I was at the training track and other trainers that I knew were making comments about how good the horse was.

"He’s been a really cool horse that’s run in big races against big competition. We gave him a little class relief in Kentucky this spring running in some starter races, just trying to get his confidence back up.”

Wachtel, who is a part-owner of the Mott-trained 2020 champion male turf horse Channel Maker , said the 8-year-old son of English Channel will remain in training in 2023. The earner of over $3.7 million was seventh in the Longines Breeders’ Cup Turf (G1T) last out to cap off a season which included victories in the Elkhorn Stakes (G2T) in April at Keeneland and the Grand Couturier Stakes in July at Belmont Park.

“Physically, the horse looks unbelievable. He’s 8-years-old and Bill and his staff said this summer that he looks better now than he did two years ago,” Wachtel said. “He’s all dappled out and he looks phenomenal, and he hasn’t lost anything.

"As long as he is physically well enough, we see no reason why we shouldn’t go on with him. He’s getting a little break, but he’s not leaving the track. We probably won’t run him until late February at the earliest.”