BY BROCK SHERIDAN

Keeneland press officials released the prospective field for next Saturday’s Grade 1, $650,000 Resolute Racing Madison and Saffie Joseph Jr.-trained Florida-breds Mystic Lake and R Disaster are among the possible contestants. For fillies and mares, 4-years-old and older at seven furlongs on the main track, the Madison was last won by a Florida-bred in 2016 when Harold L. Queen’s homebred Sheer Drama won for trainer David Fawkes with Joe Bravo aboard.

Millionaire Mystic Lake, the 2024 Florida-bred Horse of the Year, has won six of her last seven starts, all in stakes, including a four-and-a-quarter-length gallop in the $70,000 Manatee overnight handicap at Tampa Bay Downs on March 7. Owned by Miller Racing, BAG Racing Stables and Stefania Farms, Mystic Lake was fourth in last year’s Madison after winning the Grade 2 Inside Information at Gulfstream Park.

A winner of 13 of 23 career starts with earnings of $1,582,017, Mystic Lake is by Mo Town out of Salty Soul, by Itsmayluckyday and was bred in Florida by Peggy Costanzo.

Florida-bred R Disaster – ©Ryan Thompson

Multiple graded stakes-winner R Disaster has never finished worse than second in 14 career starts, most recently taking the Grade 3 Hurricane Bertie at Gulfstream Park on March 7 in her first race of the year. The 5-year-old daughter of Ocala Stud stallion Awesome Slew won half of her eight starts last year including a three-and-a-half-length victory in the Grade 2 Gallant Bloom during the Belmont at Big A meet at Aqueduct in September.

R Disaster has earned $720,890 for Richard Averill’s Averill Racing and Jaynson Werth’s Two Eight Racing, both of Bradenton, Florida; and Anthony Mattera’s ATM Racing based in Palm City, Florida. She is out of Making Havoc, by Gottcha Gold and was bred in Florida by Ocala Stud and J. Michael O’Farrell Jr.

Entries will be taken Tuesday at Keeneland for the Madison and will be published in Wire to Wire.

Return to the March 27 issue of Wire to Wire