SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – It was a victory in last summer’s Alydar Stakes that righted the ship for Art Collector, who would go on to win two more stakes in 2021, including the Grade 1 Woodward. Art Collector has taken a circuitous route back to the Alydar Stakes, a race he will run in on Thursday at Saratoga and one his connections hope helps jump-start him back to Grade 1 success at some point. In the Alydar, a 1 1/8-mile race for horses who have not won a stakes other than statebred in 2022, Art Collector will be making his first start since he finished 12th of 14 in the $20 million Saudi Cup in February. Trainer Bill Mott felt that Art Collector simply didn’t handle the surface that night. :: DRF's Saratoga headquarters – Stakes schedule, previews, recaps, past performances, and more “Without a doubt, it’s a different type of surface,” Mott said. “Safe. I’m not saying anything about that. Maybe laboring is the way to put it. Maybe that didn’t suit him well.” Making matters worse, following the Saudi Cup, transportation back to the U.S. was delayed for several weeks. Art Collector lost about three weeks of training, Mott said. When Mott did get Art Collector on a steady work schedule, he tried breezing him twice on the turf. Mott felt Art Collector preferred dirt. “I don’t think we felt like it was a big move up,” Mott said of those works on turf. Art Collector has trained well on dirt lately, including a three-furlong blowout on Saturday. He will break from post 5 under Luis Saez. Among Art Collector’s opponents is Masqueparade. Last summer, Masqueparade came to Saratoga for the Jim Dandy and Travers, finishing third and sixth, respectively. Following the Travers, his eighth race in eight months, Masqueparade was sent to a farm in South Carolina for a break, trainer Al Stall said. Masqueparade came out this year with a narrow defeat in a third-level allowance on May 13 followed by a nose win in that same condition at Churchill on June 23. Masqueparade has shown two different running styles in those races, coming from off it in the narrow loss and being right on the pace in his nose victory. “I took the blinkers off of him” at the beginning of the year, Stall said. “We always kicked him in his rear end to get him going because he was that kind of horse when he was younger. I’m thinking as an older horse he might want to come from off of it. This race doesn’t have any speed in it.” :: Visit the Saratoga Handicapping Store for Past Performances, Clocker Reports, Picks, Betting Strategies and more. Joel Rosario, who rides Masqueparade, already has seven stakes wins at this meet – all graded. Mystic Night, trained by Chad Brown, has won two allowance races to begin his 5-year-old season. He was being pointed to the Pimlico Special in May, but missed that race due to a temperature. In his only stakes try, he finished sixth in the Queens County at Aqueduct last December. Bal Harbour, second in the 2019 Woodward Stakes here, is trying to end a 0-for-19 skid. His last win came in the off-the-turf Gio Ponti Stakes at Aqueduct in November 2018. :: Get Saratoga Clocker Reports from Mike Welsch and the Clocker Team. Available every race day.   Chess Chief, who won the New Orleans Classic in 2021, and Grade 3 winner King Fury complete the field. Temperatures are forecast to be in the mid-90s Thursday with a 50 percent chance of thunderstorms.