Baffert pleased with Sprint champ Midnight Lute

Midnight Lute will try to become the first repeat winner of the Sprint (Michael J. Marten/Horsephotos.com) Trainer Bob Baffert has been pleased with the progress of defending Breeders’ Cup Sprint (G1) champion MIDNIGHT LUTE (Real Quiet), who stretched his legs Saturday on Santa Anita’s Pro-Ride under exercise rider Sarah Cillie. “I’m going to breeze him Monday, but it’s going to be very light,” Baffert said. The Eclipse Award winner’s past three works over the track have been bullets, capped by a five-furlong drill in :56 4/5 last Monday. “All I can tell you is that he’s healthy, his mind is really great,” his trainer noted. “At Del Mar, his mind was not right. He was bad at the gate, he was bad everywhere. Everything is in place right now.” Midnight Lute’s frame of mind cost him in his belated seasonal debut at Del Mar, where he did not break well and wound up 10th in the Pat O’Brien H. (G2).

“The break is important,” Baffert emphasized. “He needs to break with the
field. He’s going to be behind, but he needs to break with them, because they’re
going to outfoot him a ways until he gets in gear.”

Baffert said Midnight Lute would run without blinkers in the Sprint.

In other Breeders’ Cup news:

Unbeaten Japanese shipper CASINO DRIVE (Mineshaft), who won his debut race at
Santa Anita last Sunday, cantered one lap around Hollywood Park’s 1 1/8-mile
Cushion Track Saturday and remains on course for the Classic (G1), according to
Nobutaka Tada, racing manager for owner Hidetoshi Yamamoto.

“He will have a slow breeze at Hollywood on Wednesday,” Tada said of the
Peter Pan S. (G2) hero.

At Santa Anita on Friday, multiple Argentinean Group 1 victress LADY SPRINTER
(Orientate) worked a half-mile in :45 1/5 between races. With Octavio Vergara in
the saddle, the Juan Reviriego trainee reeled off an opening quarter in :22 2/5
and galloped out five furlongs in :58 3/5. As implied by her name, Lady Sprinter
will make her North American bow in the Filly & Mare Sprint.