Deterministic among four Grade 1 winners in G1 Fourstardave

St. Elias Stable, Ken Langone, Steven Duncker and Vicarage Stable’s Deterministic seeks a title defense, but it won’t come easily among a classy field in Saturday’s Grade 1, $750,000 Fourstardave, a one-mile inner turf test for 3-year-olds and up, at Saratoga Race Course.

The Fourstardave offers a “Win and You’re In” berth to the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile in October at Keeneland.

The multiple Grade 1-winning Deterministic, trained by Miguel Clement, is one of four Grade 1 winners in the seven-horse field, including Rhetorical, Zulu Kingdom and the filly Classic Q.

“This is a small field, but a spectacularly good one in terms of their ratings,” Clement said. “This will be a great betting race for sure, but we’ll be ready for them.”

Deterministic [post 5, Kendrick Carmouche] has made two starts this year, both successful title defenses, in the nine-furlong Grade 3 Fort Marcy in May at Belmont at the Big A and the 1 3/16-mile Grade 1 Resorts World Casino Manhattan on June 6 here. In the latter, which Deterministic won last year by a head, the 5-year-old Liam’s May bay tracked Rhetorical and kicked clear in the lane to a half-length victory in a Mellon turf record 1:50.50.

“He’s giving us every indication yet again that he is set for a very big performance,” said Clement. “Everyone [handicapping] is worried about the cutback in distance. They said the same last year and he was very impressive when he won the Fourstardave. I think when they are that good, distance doesn’t become a limitation. You are able to both stretch them out and cut them back, and they’re still able to perform at the highest level.”

Last year, Deterministic exited the Manhattan to capture the Fourstardave by 1 1/4 lengths in the final start of his campaign. He is 15-9-3-1 overall with over $2.63 million in earnings, which is almost $50,000 shy of Lagynos’ field-high, who similar to Deterministic, enters on a five-race win streak.