High Time for Highland Cat

- Highland Cat is the 6-1 4th choice in the 9th at Belmont on Wednesday; I think he’ll be a bit lower than that. As mentioned yesterday, he has the highest turf Beyer in the field other than the morning line favorite Afleet Force. He’s trained by Richard Stoklosa, who sent out the 32-1 OK To Pay to win on the grass last Friday; he has four winners in 14 Belmont starters. He’s dropping from maiden specials, and comes off his turf debut, in which he overcame a bad start to finish a close 4th at six furlongs. With the drop, this son of Northern Afleet certainly looks tough if he stretches out, and his Tomlinson and dosage figs suggest that he could.

Prairie Boy looks imposing for Bruce Levine. It’s his third on the grass, and he comes with a nice improving Beyer trend that points to a big effort here, especially shortening up to a mile.

Linda Rice has a first time starter, Bamco Dynamite. He’s a son of Dynaformer, a $100,000 sire, who sold for just $35,000 at sale, and debuts here for 45K. Rice has started two previous first-timers on the turf at this meeting; each has finished 8th at odds of 9-2 and 2-1. May be worth keeping in mind if the horse gets bet...or that could be too much information.

Highland Cat has been out since his turf debut on May 26. He raced a little erratically in that race before settling nicely in the stretch, splitting horses and rallying nicely for the place. The winner subsequently ran 6th, beaten by less than four lengths, in a $70,000 allowance race at Woodbine; the race has also produced two winners and a second. With the competition sure to get better upstate, this is a big opportunity for him to get to the winner's circle in his 8th start.

One longshot to watch could be the outside horse, Torpedo Stock. He was 13-1 in a maiden special race, broke badly, and ran last all the way around. He runs for a tag for trainer Richard Violette, hitting at 23% for the meeting, and at 32% dropping into maiden claimers. He’s by Dynaformer, out of a Relaunch mare, and he has a lot of European stakes winners in his female family, including Oratorio, as well as the North American turf winner Talakeno. He has a crummy post, but he looks like one to watch at morning line odds of 15-1.