The Westchester Handicap will be a tough race for To Honor and Serve said trainer Bill Mott
The aim of the Grade 1 Cigar Mile winner last year, To Honor and Serve, is to win the all important Grade, $750,000 Metropolitan Handicap, the Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott isn’t even sure if his 4-year-old colt is ready for the prep race for the Met Mile
called the, the Grade 3, $150,000 Westchester Handicap on 28 April, 2012, at Belmont Park to be run over a distance of 1 mile in a field of seven, 3-year-old and above colts and geldings.
To Honor and Serve hasn’t still earned the status to become the horse to beat in the Westchester Handicap, and that fact comes out in the open to embarrass the colt when fellow grade 1 winners, Boys at Tosconova and Jersey Town, both in good recent form
will overhaul any interest going toward To Honor and Serve.
These two horses will likely meet To Honor and Serve in the Met Mile Handicap, and this race holds more significance for the Live Oak Plantation colt than earlier considered.
Bred in Kentucky by Larry A. Byer, Rancho San Miguel, and Twin Creeks Farm, To Honor and Serve will return to Belmont Park after breaking his maiden back in 2010 by a massive margin of 8 ¾ lengths going over a distance of 1 1/16 miles.
“I don’t think it’s an easy race going a mile,” Mott said this week. “There are horses on their game coming off good races, fit and cranked up. For some of them, it’d be a very important race.”
“It has not been a rush job to get him ready,” Mott said. “We had plenty of time. I don’t think we squeezed him.”
On the other hand Richard Dutrow Jr. trained 4-year-old colt, is exiting a win in a Gulfstream Park’s allowance/optional claimer at a mile on 27 January, 2012.
He missed the Gulfstream Park Handicap due to a hind end issue.
“He wants to bite everybody. He’s really, really sharp right now,” Dutrow said. “It doesn’t mean he’s going to run any bigger, but it does mean he needs to run."
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