Dubai World Cup winner Magnitude, shown training at Saratoga, headlines a loaded Grade 1 Whitney for trainer Steve Asmussen and jockey Jose Ortiz. (Susie Raisher/NYRA)
Mary Eddy
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – In what is certain to be a highlight of the summer meet at Saratoga Race Course, Group 1 Dubai World Cup-winner Magnitude is among a star-studded group of contenders for this year’s Grade 1, $1 million Whitney, a nine-furlong route for 3-year-olds and up that awards a “Win and You’re In” berth to the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Classic.
“He’s had a tremendous year,” Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen said of his stable star Magnitude. “Three very significant races this year. With the company he’s kept, we couldn’t be prouder of him and we expect more of the same from him.”
The Whitney [Race 12] highlights a stacked 14-race card that includes three additional Grade 1 events in the $750,000 Fourstardave [Race 10] – a “Win and You’re In” for the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile – the $750,000 Saratoga Derby presented by Qatar Racing [Race 11] and the $500,000 Test presented by Ticketmaster [Race 9]. First post is 11:45 a.m. Eastern.
The Whitney will be broadcast to a national audience on FOX as part of a two-hour edition of FOX Saratoga Saturday, which will begin at 5 p.m. Eastern. For the complete broadcast schedule, visit https://www.nyra.com/saratoga/racing/tv-schedule/.
While Magnitude brings impeccable form to the Whitney, he by no means towers over the field of eight – seven of them millionaires – that includes reigning Horse of the Year Sovereignty, 2023 Breeders’ Cup Classic and Whitney victor White Abarrio, Champion 3-Year-Old Filly Nitrogen, and Grade 1-winners Baeza and Antiquarian. Add Grade 2 winners Tiztastic and Forged Steel to the mix and this year’s Whitney is sure to rank amongst the most impressive group of horses to contest the prestigious dirt route in recent memory.
Winchell Thoroughbreds and Asmussen teamed up to win the 2017 Whitney with subsequent Hall of Famer Gun Runner, and have a chance to do it again with Magnitude [post 1, Jose Ortiz], a 4-year-old son of Not This Time. The talented bay rides a four-race win streak into the Whitney, where he will race at Saratoga for the first time since finishing a pacesetting third to Sovereignty – winner of the Kentucky Derby and Belmont Stakes presented by NYRA Bets – in last year’s Grade 1 DraftKings Travers.
“He’s had a huge year, trained like it this spring, coming into the year,” Asmussen said, “We are obviously wanting more of the same as far as results go.”
The Travers – which he entered from a pair of stakes wins by more than nine lengths in the Grade 2 Risen Star in February and the Listed Iowa Derby in July – was the only time Magnitude was soundly beaten in his last eight starts. He followed that effort with a second to Baeza in the Grade 1 Pennsylvania Derby in September, but broke through against elders with a determined half-length win over 2025 Dubai World Cup victor Hit Show in the Grade 2 Clark in November at Churchill Downs.
The colt returned with no signs of rust as a 4-year-old with a 3 3/4-length trouncing of the Grade 3 Razorback Handicap in February at Oaklawn Park. With triple-digit Beyer Speed Figures in five of his six starts leading up to the Dubai World Cup, Magnitude was well-suited for a big effort under the lights of Meydan Racecourse.
Under regular pilot Jose Ortiz, Magnitude made the lead early and never looked back, posting an emphatic victory on the international stage without ever being significantly challenged. Global superstar Forever Young chased him the whole way around and gave his best effort in the final three-sixteenths, but the gap between them only waned slightly as Magnitude scored by one length in a final time of 2:04.38 for the race run at about 10 furlongs.
The streak continued three months later in the Grade 1 Stephen Foster on June 27 at Churchill, where another stacked field awaited Magnitude. He faced a rematch with both Sovereignty and Baeza, and a new challenge from White Abarrio. From the gate to the wire, all eyes were on Magnitude as he led each step of the way over the sloppy and sealed track en route to the 1 1/4-length win over the slow-starting Baeza, earning a 114 Beyer in victory.
“His last two wins were right up there with anything we’ve ever done,” said Asmussen, the winningest trainer in North American history. “The Dubai World Cup and the Stephen Foster with the previous year’s Derby winner in it. Those were very exciting races. I feel extremely proud of what he’s gotten done, but we are looking to add to it.”
Asmussen will also send out Grade 2-winner Tiztastic [post 7, Tyler Gaffalione] for Winchell, who co-owns the 4-year-old son of Tiz the Law with the Coolmore partners of Mrs. John Magnier, Michael B. Tabor and Derrick Smith. The dark bay colt was last seen posting a solid third-place effort in the Grade 2 Suburban presented by Subourbon Life behind runaway winner Phileas Fogg, rallying from ninth-of-11 to get his neck down over Antiquarian for the minor awards.
“That was a pretty good effort last time, decent,” Asmussen said. “I thought he could’ve had a little less traffic, but with where he comes from, that’s what happens.”
A dual-surface stakes winner, Tiztastic won the Grade 2 Louisiana Derby last year at Fair Grounds Race Course ahead of a 10th-place finish in the Kentucky Derby. This year, he won his return to dirt after a short grass stint, taking a nine-furlong May optional-claimer at Churchill Downs ahead of the Suburban.
Tiztastic has banked over $1.7 million via a 15-4-1-3 record that includes three additional graded placings.
The Whitney is the rubber match for Magnitude and Godolphin’s Kentucky homebred Sovereignty, who looks to right the ship in his third start this year for Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott.
The son of Into Mischief was brilliant in his award-winning sophomore campaign, winning the Grade 2 Fountain of Youth en route to a four-race win streak that began with his 1 1/2-length Kentucky Derby triumph and local wins in the Belmont Stakes over good dirt and the Jim Dandy presented by Mohegan Sun.
In the Travers, he was last-of-5 through the opening quarter-mile as Magnitude set a pressured pace, and was full of run when asked for his best heading into the far turn, reeling in Bracket Buster and powering home in a 10-length romp to cement his place atop the sophomore male division and earn a career-best 115 Beyer.
“I know he runs well over that surface,” Mott said of the colt’s return to Saratoga for the first time since the Travers. “One time it had some moisture in it, not a lot I don’t think, and the other times they were fast racetracks. He’s proven he runs over the course.”
Sovereignty was set to cap his campaign in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Classic at Del Mar, and made the trip to California, but was scratched due to illness and was away from the races for another six months. He returned in the Grade 2 Oaklawn Handicap on April 18 and dueled for the early lead with White Abarrio before that foe took back and Journalism joined the fray. Sovereignty and Journalism, who finished 1-2 in both the Kentucky Derby and Belmont, were at it again in the late stages, but it was White Abarrio who stole the show when rallying to the two-length win.
Looking for redemption in the Foster, Sovereignty rated in fourth throughout under regular pilot Junior Alvarado, but ran evenly as he finished a flat third 5 1/4 lengths behind Magnitude. Still, the effort produced a 106 Beyer, two points higher than the figure he received in winning the Kentucky Derby and Jim Dandy.
Mott said Sovereignty, who was notably mature and professional throughout his sophomore campaign, continues to show those same attributes at four.
“He’s much the same horse,” Mott said. “I don’t think there’s been any drastic changes in him.”
Alvarado, aboard for all but one of Sovereignty’s 11 starts, returns to the irons from post 6.
Not to be left out of the conversation is C R K Stable and Grandview Equine’s Baeza [post 8, Flavien Prat], who looks for smoother sailing from the gate after both his outings this year were hampered by a poor start. Also representing the Mott barn, Baeza was strong in both the Grade 2 Alysheba in his seasonal bow on May 1 at Churchill and the Foster, with impressive late rallies in both.
The McKinzie bay has kept top company throughout the majority of his career, which began in California with the late Hall of Fame trainer John Shirreffs. He was a close second to Journalism in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby to earn his spot in the Kentucky Derby, where he ran third to Sovereignty and Journalism in a trifecta that was duplicated in the Belmont Stakes.
Second in the Jim Dandy, he landed his breakout score in the Pennsylvania Derby in what was the last Grade 1 win for Shirreffs, and concluded his season with a troubled-start sixth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic. Mott took over the colt’s training this year, and will look to see him improve at the start with the aid of quarter pads on each side of him in the gate.
Mott said he likes what he’s seen from Baeza when he has schooled in the gate with the quarter pads.
“He’s been good,” Mott said. “We’ve put him in with the quarter pads and he stands good and is comfortable in there, which is good. We just have to hope he comes out. They’ve got to react when the gate opens. We’ve done a few things, and the main thing is we hope he stands up there good. He seems to be focused now and we just need to see him break.”
While Baeza and Sovereignty are both formidable contenders in their own right, Mott acknowledged the accomplished field they will face Saturday.
“I think it is a field of horses that are in good form,” Mott said. “It looks like everybody is, Magnitude is in spectacular form. Baeza, I’d say, is in good form. Sovereignty, his two races, one of them was pretty good, the other one was disappointing, but that’s the only disappointing race he’s ever run in his life.”
D.J. Stable’s reigning Champion 3-Year-Old Filly Nitrogen looks to make her way into the history books and join Black Maria [1928], Bateau [1929], Esposa [1937], Gallorette [1948], Lady’s Secret [1986] and Personal Ensign [1988] as fillies to win the Whitney. Nitrogen will be one of only three fillies to have attempted the feat since Personal Ensign, with Serena’s Song finishing second in 1996 and Swiss Skydiver landing fourth in 2021.
Trainer Mark Casse said a win in the Whitney would almost guarantee the 4-year-old daughter of Medaglia d’Oro joining him and his star pupil Tepin in the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame just across Union Avenue from the Spa.
“Tepin already is in the Hall of Fame, and one of the things that put her in the Hall of Fame was beating colts and winning the Breeders’ Cup,” he said. “If it’s possible, I would love to see Nitrogen in the Hall of Fame, but in order to do that, she can’t just beat up on the girls. I think Nitrogen deserves the chance at it. A Whitney win puts her in the Hall of Fame. And puts her in consideration for Horse of the Year.”
Nitrogen, who finished a neck second in her career bow facing males in August 2024 at Woodbine Racetrack, has earned another chance against male rivals following sublime efforts against her own sex over the past 19 months, beginning with a five-race win streak to kick off her sophomore campaign last January.
The bay won four straight races on turf and moved to dirt when the Grade 3 Wonder Again came off the grass last June here, leading to a 17-length trouncing over one-mile of sloppy and sealed footing. She is a nose away from being a dual-surface Grade 1 winner, just missing to Fionn in the Grade 1 Belmont Oaks Invitational last July.
Nitrogen has raced exclusively on dirt since, and notched her first top-level win in the 10-furlong Grade 1 Alabama presented by Keeneland Sales before runner-up efforts against elders in the Grade 1 Spinster and Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Distaff to close out her award-winning campaign.
Nitrogen got back to winning ways in her seasonal bow, taking the Grade 3 Bayakoa in February at Oaklawn Park before a third-place finish in the Grade 2 Azeri and runner-up effort to Claret Beret in the Grade 1 Apple Blossom Handicap. Despite those losses, she was an emphatic 12 3/4-length winner of the Grade 1 Ogden Phipps presented by Ford in wire-to-wire fashion in her most recent effort on June 5 here, earning a lofty 113 Beyer and making her a perfect 3-for-3 over the Spa dirt.
“I don’t think you can ever expect that,” Casse said of the Phipps performance. “That performance was bigger than I could ever expect. She loves it here. She’s happy. I don’t know whether it’s the weather or the track.”
Nitrogen has won with a variety of tactics, and Casse said he will leave that decision on Saturday to fellow Hall of Famer John Velazquez from post 2.
“I have one of the greatest riders of all time, Johnny Velazquez,” Casse said. “I’ll leave it up to him. I’m sure that if she breaks running and nobody wants the lead, she’ll be on the lead. But she also can settle, so it doesn’t really matter.”
Nitrogen, a half-sister to multiple graded stakes-placed Love to Shop, is out of the stakes-placed Uncle Mo mare Tiffany Case, who sold for $3.2 million at the 2026 Keeneland January Horses of All Ages sale and is a half-sister to graded stakes-winner Talk Veuve to Me.
The field will feature a previous Whitney winner in C2 Racing Stable, Gary Barber and La Milagrosa Stables’ 2023 victor White Abarrio [post 5, Irad Ortiz, Jr.], a last-out fourth in the Foster over a wet racetrack that trainer Saffie Joseph, Jr. said was not to his prized 7-year-old’s liking.
“We are excited,” Joseph, Jr. said. “Hopefully, we get a nice, fast track for everybody. He won the Pegasus a couple years ago with his fastest Ragozin figure, and I think he’s as good, if not better, than he was then. We feel like he’s doing as good as ever and he’s training just as enthusiastic as ever. If he shows up and runs, he goes in with as good a chance as any of the others.”
The gray, nearly snow-white son of Race Day has attracted a large fanbase over his six-season career, which has featured wins in the Grade 1 Florida Derby as a sophomore and the Whitney and Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Classic in 2023, the latter two wins for trainer Rick Dutrow, Jr. Last year, he won Gulfstream Park’s Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup for Joseph, Jr. and pounced from off the pace to land the Oaklawn Handicap this April in his second of three starts this campaign following a second to stablemate Skippylongstocking in this year’s Pegasus.
Joseph, Jr. said the experience in the Foster was still special despite the flat finish as fans lined up to see the earner of more than $8.5 million race for the 27th time.
“At Churchill when he came in the paddock, everybody cheered for him and how many people come out on the tours here and are like, ‘wow, White Abarrio!’ To see people appreciate a horse like that, it’s special to be a part of that,” Joseph, Jr. said. “He’s been going for so long and with so many accomplishments, he’s created a big fanbase. We are grateful to him and thankful to have a horse like that.”
Joseph, Jr. also sends out C2 Racing Stable, Mathis Stable and TCC Stables’ Grade 2-winner Forged Steel [post 4, Micah Husbands], who was a last-out fifth in the Suburban. The 4-year-old son of Vekoma was a dominant 9 1/2-length winner of the Hollywood Gold Cup two starts back at Santa Anita Park, and tracked one length off the pace in the Suburban before weakening in the latter stages. He will make his Grade 1 debut in the Whitney.
Completing the stacked field is Centennial Farms’ Grade 1-winner Antiquarian [post 3, Manny Franco], who enters from a troubled fourth in the Suburban for Hall of Fame trainer Todd Pletcher.
Winner of the Grade 1 Jockey Club Gold Cup last August here, the 5-year-old son of Preservationist stumbled badly at the start of the Suburban and tracked in seventh-of-11 before making a willing bid, but was unable to reel in Phileas Fogg and was edged out of show honors by Tiztastic.
“Hopefully, we can get back into his normal running style, more of a stalking type, get into a good rhythm,” said Pletcher, who stands at 5,997 career wins as of Sunday. “By all means, a super difficult race, but we feel like he belongs.”
Pletcher seeks a record-equaling fifth Whitney victory after previous scores with Left Bank [2002], Lawyer Ron [2007], Cross Traffic [2013] and Life Is Good [2022].
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