It may be August with summer temperatures in the Adirondack Mountains, but it was the Big A at Saratoga Race Course on Aug. 15.
Specifically, memories of Jan. 22, 2026 at the dearly departed Aqueduct Racetrack were resurrected Saturday at the Spa when trainer Linda Rice duplicated her wintertime feat at the Big A by winning five races at Saratoga.
Rice's five wins tied the track record, which was matched as recently as Aug. 1 when trainer Todd Pletcher registered five victories.
"Five winners at any racetrack at any time is great fun. Really exciting," said Rice, who has won five races in one day three times. "But to do it at Saratoga was exceptionally exciting. I had my staff here for the weekend, so they got to be a part of it and enjoy it. That was really a lot of fun for us."
Aside from the five wins Saturday with Scramjet, Lady Rose, Bite and Strike, Calling Card, and Maximum Heat, Rice took the Aug. 16 opener with Caddiemaster and the fifth race with Seeker's Hope. That gave her 23 wins for the meet, three behind the meet leader, Chad Brown, with three full weeks of racing left until the Labor Day finale.
"We got off to a slow start and were struggling at the meet, but it's coming together now very well," said Rice, who dominated winter racing at Aqueduct earlier this year. "You always hope you can do better than you did the year before. We were third behind Chad and Todd last year, who tied for the title, and we were just hoping for a little better racing luck and a little better results this year."
Rice is getting better luck and results this summer, and then some.
Finishing third at the 2025 meet came after a surge in the final days of the meet lifted her into a tie with Brown for the 2023 crown, each with 35 winners apiece. Given what's happened this weekend at the Spa, it should be a lively race to the wire for the H. Allen Jerkens Trophy as this meet's leading trainer.
"We have some live horses, but it's going to be hard to sustain what we did Saturday," Rice said with a laugh. "But hopefully we'll get a few more winners."
As she battled for the Saratoga title, Rice has already won three meets at New York Racing Association tracks.
She recorded an amazing 62 wins at the Aqueduct winter meet, more than tripling the total of the runner-up, Brad Cox, who had 19.
Her barn continued to roll at the Aqueduct spring meet, where she won the title with 21 wins. The victories kept coming at the Belmont at the Big A spring meet as she notched 29 wins to take top honors among trainers.
The only meet she did not top the standings was the brief June 3-7 stay at Saratoga for Belmont Stakes (G1) week.
The 62-year-old Rice captured her first Spa training title in 2009 when she recorded 20 victories.
