Saratoga Snacks Seeks Empire Classic Rebound

Defending champion Saratoga Snacks takes on eight fellow New York-breds Oct. 18 in the $300,000 Empire Classic Handicap, the main feature on Empire Showcase Day at Belmont Park.

Anchoing eight stakes races featuring New York-breds competing for $1.75 million in purses, the 1 1/8-mile Empire Classic also features the top three from the Albany Stakes—winner So Lonesome, runner-up Effinex, and third-place finisher Eye Luv Lulu—along with New York Derby hero Empire Dreams, and Evan Shipman star Sinistra.

Sinistra shares highweight assignment of 121 pounds with multiple allowance winner Beautyinthepulpit from their respective posts 1 and 7.

Saratoga Snacks took the 2013 Empire Classic with a determined run to best Bigger is Bettor by three-quarters of a length. Since then, the Bill Mott trainee has started just four times, ending his 2013 campaign with an eighth in the Cigar Mile (gr. I) and finishing second Jan. 19 in a minor stakes at Aqueduct Racetrack before going to the sidelines.     

Returned to racing by Mott in August, Saratoga Snacks was fourth in the John Morrisey Stakes at Saratoga Race Course before running sixth in a Sept. 20 allowance at Belmont. He is a 5-year-old son of Tale of the Cat  .

Mott also has New York Oaks winner Flipcup in the $250,000 Empire Distaff, which drew a field of 11 New York-bred fillies and mares led by Richard Greeley's 122-pound highweight Carameaway.

Flipcup, a 3-year-old daughter of Milwaukee Brew   who starts for Penney Racing, Wachtel Stable, and Brous Stable, has been knocking at the door with back-to-back runner-up finishes in the Eternal Search Stakes at Woodbine and the Aug. 24 Fleet Indian Stakes at Saratoga.

Carameaway, a 4-year-old homebred by Lawyer Ron, is coming off consecutive authorotative victories in the Saratoga Dew Stakes and in a Sept. 19 allowance for state-breds at Belmont for trainer Mitchell E. Friedman.