Eclipse Award-winning trainer Todd Pletcher
indicated Monday that Twin Creeks Racing Stables’ Mission Impazible,
winner of last season’s Grade II Louisiana Derby, is now being
considered for this season’s Grade III Mineshaft Handicap Feb. 19
as well as the upcoming Grade II New Orleans
Handicap on Louisiana Derby Day March 26.
Mission
Impazible returned to the races Sunday at Gulfstream
Park
in his first start since last spring’s Kentucky Derby and finished second in a
one-mile allowance race.
Pletcher
is the most recent trainer to win the Louisiana Derby one year and the New
Orleans Handicap the next year with the same horse, a feat he accomplished in
2007 and 2008 with Michael and Doreen Tabor’s Circular Quay.
The 43-year-old native of Dallas,
Texas,
also won last year’s New Orleans Handicap with Overbrook Farm’s Battle Plan
and the 2007 edition with Aaron and Marie Jones’ Master Command.