Aqueduct: Coil shipping in for Cigar Mile

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – As trainer Bob Baffert was preparing to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with his in-laws in Tennessee, one of his Grade 1-winning horses was getting ready to hit the road to New York for Saturday’s Grade 1, $350,000 Cigar Mile at Aqueduct.

Coil, winner of the Grade 1 Santa Anita Sprint Championship last month, will try to rebound from his seventh-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint when he runs in what is expected to be a seven-horse field for Saturday’s Cigar Mile, the last Grade 1 race in 2012 on this circuit.

Coil will be the starting highweight at 120 pounds in the Cigar Mile against a field that was expected to include Groupie Doll (118), Stay Thirsty (118), Hymn Book (117), Jersey Town (117), Buffum (116), and Associate (115) when entries were made and post positions drawn Wednesday.

Baffert, a three-time winner of the Cigar Mile, said Coil had no chance in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint given how Santa Anita’s main track favored speed and his horse comes from off the pace in sprints.

“You had to come back completely clean,” said Baffert, referring to the fact that speed horses don’t get dirt kicked at them. “If I had known the track would have been like that, we would have gone in the [Dirt] Mile.”

Baffert said Coil – as was the case with all of his Breeders’ Cup starters – came out of the Sprint in excellent shape and has worked well since. Coil, a son of Point Given, is a Grade 1 winner at 1 1/8 miles and six furlongs, and Baffert said he is looking to “pad his r é sum é ” for those interested in Coil as a stallion prospect.

“It’s a good spot for him,” said Baffert, who has Martin Garcia to ride.

Baffert won the Cigar Mile in 2000 with El Corredor and in 2002-03 with Congaree. In 2003, Congaree won the Cigar Mile after running fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic.