Groupie Doll has final Cigar Mile workout

By: SPORTS NETWORK

Ozone Park, NY (SportsNetwork.com) - Champion sprinter Groupie Doll put in her final workout Monday ahead of Saturday's $500,000 Cigar Mile at Aqueduct.

Groupie Doll, recently bought by Mandy Pope's Whisper Hill Farm, worked four furlongs at Belmont Park in 48.55 seconds and galloped out five furlongs in 1:01.79. Exercise rider Jada Schlenk was aboard the 5-year-old mare.

"(Schlenk) said that might have been the best she ever worked over that track," said trainer Buff Bradley. "I said, 'That's great,' so we're very happy with that, and, as you saw, she had a tough time pulling her up.

"We'll just take her out and just do light work with her, keep her happy. She looked very happy in the work and galloping out. Coming home, she looked happy. As Matt (groom Matt Hebert) and Jada both said, she's not blowing very hard."

Groupie Doll won her second straight Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint with jockey Rajiv Maragh at Santa Anita on Nov. 2. Last year, she followed her Sprint victory with a second-place finish to Stay Thirsty in the Cigar, losing by a nose.

The mare has earned $2,478,850 in 21 lifetime starts with 11 wins, four seconds and four thirds.

The Eclipse Award winner was assigned 118 pounds for the Cigar, second to the 120 pounds put on Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile winner Goldencents.

Rounding out the probable starters and their weights are Private Zone, 118; Flat Out, 119; Verrazano, 117; Breeders' Cup Sprint runner-up Laugh Track, 116; Capo Bastone, 115; Clearly Now, 115 and Forty Tales, 115.