The opening week's stakes action at The Red Mile will conclude on Saturday (Oct. 1) with a slew of eight sophomore splits of Bluegrass action on the 13-race card.

Pacing glamour boys will compete in two divisions of the $178,000 Captaintreacherous Bluegrass Stakes. The first division, carded as Race 2, pins Kentucky Championship Series runners-up Pebble Beach and Caviart Camden in a rematch and against six other foes. Dexter Dunn will pilot Caviart Camden for trainer Tony Alagna from post three while Todd McCarthy has the steer on Pebble Beach, winner of the 2022 Pepsi North America Cup, from post four for conditioner Noel Daley.

Division two, going as the last of the afternoon’s stakes in Race 12, oozes star power with the arrival of Beach Glass (pictured above) to the scene of his sire’s greatest achievement. Yannick Gingras will drive the Brent MacGrath pupil from post three in a stacked field including Meadowlands Pace runner-up Mad Max Hanover (starting from post four), Kentucky Championship winner I Did It Myway (post five) and Little Brown Jug runner-up Fourever Boy (post six).

The trotting glamour boys will begin their black-type tangos in Race 3 with the first of two divisions for the $237,000 Greenshoe Bluegrass Stakes. Hambletonian favourite Rebuff drew post one and will try to rebound from a second-place finish in the Kentucky Championship final. Tim Tetrick will sit in the bike behind the Lucas Wallin trainee in a nine-horse field that includes another pair of Hambletonian finalists in Periculum (post six) and Looks Like Moni (post eight).

Sophomore trotting colts and geldings will return to the track in Race 8 with Marcus Melander pupil Temporal Hanover the one to beat. Brian Sears will stick with the colt who finished third in the Hambletonian following a second-place finish in a final-quarter sprint in the $275,000 New Jersey Classic “A” division. He will start just outside of Ray Schnittker trainee King Of The North (post one) and will also encounter a late-developing prospect from the Lucas Wallin stable in Pennsylvania Sires Stakes champ Pour Mea Double (post seven).

Marcus Melander will also send out the morning-line favourite in the first of three divisions for the $242,300 Bar Hopping Bluegrass Stakes. Peyton Hanover has landed post seven off a fourth-place finish in the Elegantimage final at Woodbine Mohawk Park and will start just inside of More Than Ever, who just missed a sweep of the Kentucky Commonwealth Series when finishing second in the final by a nose. The first division also includes the quirky gaited Warrawee Xenia as she attempts to make amends from the pylon post for a stretch-drive miscue in the Elegantimage.

Jiggy Jog S, one of two fillies to compete in this year’s Hambletonian, will score from post six in the second grouping, carded as Race 7. Dexter Dunn will have the reins on the Ake Svanstedt student off a second-place finish to Fashion Schooner in the $275,000 New Jersey Classic “A” division on Sept. 9 at The Meadowlands. She will compete in a field that includes Red Mile lover Date Night (post three), Hambletonian Oaks runner-up Pink Coco Chanel (post seven) and Mon Cheval (post eight), the latter of all finished third in the Elegantimage.

Fillies will finish their stakes contests in Race 11 as the final division. All focus will be on Joviality S, the Marcus Melander-trained debutante who has only missed the winner’s circle twice in 11 starts. Brian Sears will steer the Hambletonian runner-up from post five in an eight-horse affair that includes Red Mile speedster Selfie Queen (post seven), who most recently finished second in the Kentucky Championship final.

An overflow field will align in Race 10 for the lone Bluegrass sophomore pacing filly dash – a $150,000 event monikered “The Papi Rob Hanover.” Last season’s sensation Niki Hill will try to rekindle her freshman season magic in her third start of the year, entering here off a second-place finish against older competition at The Meadowlands. Dexter Dunn will drive the Chris Ryder trainee from post seven in the 11-horse race that includes late-blooming sophomore Max Contract (post one), New York Sires Stakes champ Just Divine (post two), Kentucky Championship winner Boudoir Hanover (post five) and Kentucky Commonwealth winner Queen Of Success (post eight).

Every Bluegrass division on Saturday is sponsored in part by Hanover Shoe Farms. Each Bluegrass division for the respective sex and gait is sponsored in part by the stallion syndicate for which each is named.

First-race post time is 1 p.m. (EDT).

(With files from The Red Mile)