Jockeys Find Keeneland Mile Race Challenging

After winning the first main-track mile race held in many years—perhaps ever—at Keeneland, jockey Corey Lanerie had some advice for riders trying the distance in the weeks to come, including the Oct. 30 Las Vegas Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile (gr. I): Get out of the gate.

"You need to break well, that's for sure, especially if you're on the outside," Lanerie said after guiding Street Strategy to an off-the-pace win Oct. 9 in the seventh race, an allowance-optional claiming event. "I think you can be all right on the outside with a horse with speed. You'll have to break well; if you miss the break I'm not sure there will be many good options."

Keeneland has put four one-mile main track races in the condition book this fall in advance of the Dirt Mile, and Friday's race was the first offered at the meet. The gate was placed 70 yards before the one-mile pole, where the official timing began, to allow some extra distance from the gate to the first turn.

The mile races finish at the sixteenth-pole, Keeneland's short stretch, on the 1 1/16-mile surface.

"Actually, there was a little more time to the first turn than what I'd have guessed," Lanerie said. "But it's not much, you definitely have to make a quick decision."

Keeneland officials said the six-horse race for 3-year-olds and older was the first at the one-mile distance at the Lexington track, but previously other officials said it was at least the first in many years. Before the race, track announcer Kurt Becker noted the historical nature of the race: "One mile on the main track," he said before pausing, "at Keeneland."

On the first turn in Friday's race, Neck 'n Neck, who started from post 5, was caught four-wide under Paco Lopez, and Emmanuel Esquivel, who broke from post 6 aboard Street Spice, found himself five-wide early. Street Strategy setted into position three-wide.

"I think for a six-horse field it was all right," Esquivel said. "I'm not sure how it's going to do with a larger field."

Lopez noted that he prefers one-turn miles, and said many two-turn mile races create challenges for riders.

"As a rider, you have to adjust to the distance," noted Lopez, who finished second aboard Neck 'n Neck.

Typically, Keeneland's shortest two-turn races offered have been 1 1/16 miles. Keeneland and Breeders' Cup officials determined that the one-mile configuration, with the run-up, at the Lexington track actually offers a longer distance to the first turn than Santa Anita Park.

With the run-up into the turn, the first quarter was completed in :23.83 by early leader Pablo Del Monte, who led through a half-mile in :47.63. Iron Horse Racing's Street Strategy, trained by Randy Morse, rallied from fifth early and surged to a 1 1/4-length victory, completing the mile in 1:36.23 on a fast track.

For now, it's a track record.