The midsummer weeks on the North American horse racing calendar traditionally signal a turning of the page from the Triple Crown to preparing for the Breeders’ Cup World Championships in the fall, and the month of June closes with the first domestic “Win and You’re In” Challenge Series race for the 2024 Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic taking place under the Twin Spires at Churchill Downs: the 43^rd running of the Stephen Foster Stakes.

The Stephen Foster winner gets a guaranteed spot in the starting gate of the $7 million Longines Classic Nov. 2 at Del Mar, with entry fees waived and a travel stipend provided if the horse is stabled outside of California. It’s the only “Win and You’re In” race this weekend, but there are a couple of other races coming up that have also been significant in the 41-year history of the Breeders’ Cup. Let’s look ahead:

Stephen Foster Stakes

Where: Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky.

When: Saturday, June 29

How to Watch: FanDuel TV

“Win and You’re In” for: Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic

Why it’s important: This 1 1/8-mile dirt race, which carries a purse of up to $1 million for 2024, has been won by some of the best horses of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Five of them – Black Tie Affair (1991), Awesome Again (1997), Saint Liam (2005), Blame (2010), and Gun Runner (2017) – won the Stephen Foster and the Breeders’ Cup Classic in the same year. Two other Stephen Foster winners – Curlin and Fort Larned – won the Classic at other points in their careers.

Best winner during the Breeders’ Cup era: Tie between Curlin (2008) and Gun Runner (2017). Curlin, who had won the 2007 Breeders’ Cup Classic as a 3-year-old and been voted Horse of the Year, toyed with a Foster field that included $2 million earners Einstein and Brass Hat, winning by 4 ¼ lengths. He would be voted Horse of the Year again in 2008 and entered the Racing Hall of Fame in 2014. Gun Runner will join Curlin in that hallowed venue as part of the 2024 Hall of Fame class Aug. 2. He romped in the 2017 Foster by seven lengths and earned the highest Equibase Speed Figure (127) in the history of the race. Gun Runner then won the final four starts of his career in similarly overpowering fashion, including the Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic at Del Mar, and was voted Horse of the Year for 2017.

Last year’s winner: West Will Power won a most unusual edition of the Stephen Foster as the race was relocated to Ellis Park in Henderson, Ky., along with every other race scheduled the final month of Churchill Downs’ 2023 spring-summer meet while the parent company of both tracks ran tests on the racing surface at its flagship venue after a spike in equine fatalities. The Brad Cox trainee won the Foster by a half-length over fast-closing Rattle N Roll; unfortunately, it was the final start in the horse’s career. West Will Power was retired weeks later due to a soft-tissue injury and subsequently sold to stand as a stallion in Korea.

2024 starters: This year’s competitive Foster field is led by multiple graded stakes winners First Mission and Skippylongstocking, both of whom come into the Breeders’ Cup prep on two-race winning streaks accomplished in dominant fashion. Learn more about all of the nine contenders in ABR’s Cheat Sheet.

Other key races this weekend:

From 2015 to 2021, the 1 1/8-mile Fasig-Tipton Fleur de Lis Stakes for fillies and mares at Churchill was a “Win and You’re In” qualifier for the Longines Breeders’ Cup Distaff. Whether part of the Challenge Series or not, this race held on the Saturday Stephen Foster undercard has been important in preparing some of the best female racehorses in training for attempts at the Distaff in the fall. Three of them have won the Fleur de Lis and Distaff in the same year: Escena (1998), Hall of Famer Royal Delta (2012), and Forever Unbridled (2017).

The great Wise Dan. (Eclipse Sportswire)

Another race Saturday at Churchill, the one-mile Wise Dan Stakes on turf, is named after a Hall of Fame racehorse who dominated his division a little over a decade ago. Wise Dan had raced nine times on dirt or synthetic tracks – including a sixth-place finish in the 2010 Breeders’ Cup Sprint – and won a stakes race before trainer Charlie LoPresti tried him on turf in the 2011 Firecracker Handicap at Churchill. His performance was a revelation as he romped by 2 ¾ lengths, and from then on a legendary career was formed. Subsequently racing primarily on grass, Wise Dan won the FanDuel Breeders’ Cup Mile in both 2012 and 2013 and also captured an incredible 15 other graded stakes races, including the 2013 Firecracker in a driving rainstorm. The gelding even tallied a Grade 1 win on dirt during that streak, taking the Clark Handicap at Churchill in fall 2011, and nearly won the Stephen Foster on dirt the following summer, losing by a head to Ron the Greek.

Wise Dan was voted Horse of the Year, champion older male, and champion turf male for both 2012 and 2013, and in 2016 the Firecracker was renamed in his honor.  One other horse joins Wise Dan as same-year winners of this race and the Breeders’ Cup Mile: Miesque’s Approval in 2006.