Imagining, trained by Hall of Famer Shug McGaughey, will go for a second straight victory in Saturday's $400,000 Man o' War Stakes at Belmont Park versus six challengers in the 1 3/8-mile turf stakes.
Owned by Phipps Stable, Imagining won last year's Man o' War by three-quarters of a length. The win was the third straight in the Man o' War for both owner and trainer. Phipps Stable and McGaughey won in 2013 with Boisterous after claiming the 2012 renewal with Point of Entry.
Imagining will again be ridden by Irad Ortiz Jr. Saturday, leaving from the inside post in the seven-horse field.
The 7-year-old chestnut horse comes into the Man o' War off a win in Gulfstream Park's Pan American on March 28.
"We're just tickled to death with his efforts. Sometimes, when they get to be 7 years old, you get to wondering, 'Are they still there?' But he showed me today that he still was," McGaughey said after the Pan American.
Imagining opened his 2015 campaign, however, with an eighth-place finish to Mshawish, beaten by less than three lengths, in the Gulfstream Park Turf Handicap on Feb. 7.
Imagining has banked $1,095,394 with nine wins and five seconds in 22 career starts. He has won half of his 10 lifetime starts at Belmont Park for better than $500,000.
Arlington Million champ Hardest Core will begin his 2015 season in the Man o' War with Luis Saez riding from post 6. The 5-year-old gelding is owned by Andrew Bentley Stables and trained by Edward Graham.
Hardest Core won last year's Million as a 11-1 longshot, but raced just once more in 2014, finishing eighth in the Breeders' Cup Turf at Santa Anita on Nov. 1. The gelding has earned $842,580 with wins in half of his 12 career starts.
From the rail out here is the field for the Man o' War: Imagining, Irad Ortiz Jr.; Hyper, John Velazquez; War Dancer, Jose Lezcano; Twilight Eclipse, Javier Castellano; Comes the Dream; Junior Alvarado; Hardest Core, Luis Saez and Dynamic Sky, Cornelio Velasquez.
The Man o' War will go off at approximately 5:28 p.m. ET.
[SportsNetwork.com]
