NEW YORK -- When Smarty Jones goes for the Triple Crown in
the Belmont Stakes next Saturday, Tapit and The Cliff's Edge won't
be around to try and stop him.
The Cliff's Edge finished fifth behind Smarty Jones in the
Kentucky Derby, but missed the Preakness with a bruised right front
foot. The colt has recovered, but after a workout Saturday at
Saratoga, trainer Nick Zito pulled his Blue Grass Stakes winner
from consideration.
"He got very, very tired after the work," Zito said, and after
talking to owner Robert LaPenta, "we decided not to run. He missed
a whole week of training in Baltimore, so he would have been only
90 percent ready to run in the Belmont."
Tapit, ninth in the Derby, will miss the race because he has not
"fully recovered from the remnants of lung disease," according to
a posting on trainer Michael Dickinson's Tapeta Farm Web site.
David Fiske, racing manager for Winchell Thoroughbreds, Tapit's
owners, said allergies may have caused the gray colt to develop a
lung infection following a sixth-place finish in the Florida Derby.
Tapit was healthy enough to win the Wood Memorial before running in
the Kentucky Derby.
"He's just not 100 percent and he would have to be 110 percent
to beat Smarty Jones, so we're not going to run," Fiske told the
Thoroughbred Times.
Zito still plans to run Birdstone and Royal Assault in the
Belmont. Other contenders include Rock Hard Ten and Eddington,
second and third, respectively, in the Preakness; Master David,
Purge, Tap Dancer and Caiman.
With the latest defections, the trainers of Purge and Master
David are now reconsidering their original plans to pass on the
race.
Purge, beaten twice by Smarty Jones in Arkansas, was an
impressive winner of the Peter Pan Stakes last week at Belmont.
Master David, 12th in the Derby, was third in the Peter Pan.
Trainer Todd Pletcher said he will make a decision on Purge
after the colt works out Monday.
"There is a chance," Pletcher said. "There's probably a
little better chance now then there was a week ago."
"I might enter, but that's about it," Master David's trainer
Bobby Frankel said.
Meanwhile, Smarty Jones took a 25-minute walk around
Philadelphia Park on Saturday, a day after he worked seven furlongs
in 1:29.20.
"He came out of the work perfect," barn foreman Bill Foster
said. During the walk, "he was really on the muscle -- squealing
and bucking. I even had to put a shank in his mouth to keep him
under control."
Smarty Jones, who will attempt to become the 12th Triple Crown
champion and first since Affirmed in 1978, could arrive at Belmont
either Tuesday night or Wednesday.
The post position draw is Wednesday.