Instant Coffee might strike some as a prototypical speedless grinding type, but with a boiling pace in front of him, the 3-year-old colt roasted five foes winning the Grade 3, $200,000 Lecomte Stakes by 2 1/2 lengths Saturday at Fair Grounds.   In the last of 14 races, Instant Coffee went last to first as trainer Brad Cox and jockey Luis Saez followed up on their win with 3-year-old filly The Alys Look in the Silverbulletday Stakes for 3-year-old fillies earlier Saturday. The Alys Look upset the odds-on Cox-trained favored Chop Chop, but there was no upset brewing in the Lecomte.   Instant Coffee, the 6-5 favorite, got a dream setup and made sweet work of things, wearing down a game Two Phil’s through the final furlong and winning the Lecomte in his first start at age 3 after closing his 2-year-old campaign with a victory in the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club at Churchill Downs. Churchill has a long homestretch that suits late-running Instant Coffee, and the Fair Grounds stretch is even longer.  “This track is good for him,” said Saez. “I felt like when he came to the stretch he wanted to pass everybody and get there first.”  :: DRF Bets players have exclusive access to FREE DRF Past Performances - Classic or Formulator! Join today.  Dylan Davis rode Instant Coffee to a debut victory at Saratoga, but Saez was aboard when Instant Coffee finished a wide and well-beaten fourth in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland and again in the Kentucky Jockey Club, where Instant Coffee overcame ground loss and a slow pace.  The Lecomte pace was anything but slow, with Echo Again tearing off from post 1 to go his first quarter mile in 24.20 and a half in an enervating 47.19. One race earlier, the half-mile split in the Louisiana Stakes for older horses at the Lecomte distance of 1 1/16 miles had been 49.75. Last into the second turn and halfway around it, Instant Coffee held perfect position given the tempo.  Two Phil’s, the second choice, had been wrangled back to fifth in the early and middle stages by jockey Jareth Loveberry. He clearly had run around the far turn and was the first to strike, swooping four paths off the rail to take a lead at the quarter pole. Instant Coffee followed that move, coming abreast Two Phil’s at the furlong grounds and pushing out to a clear victory.   Confidence Game raced three wide with no cover around the first turn, pulling hard down the backstretch while in close attendance to the strong pace, and was wide again on the second bend. He finished third, beaten 5 1/4 lengths by Two Phil’s, but ran better than the bare margin of defeat. Denington, racing with blinkers added, came home a one-paced fourth, and it was a long way back to fifth-place Bromley, who pressed the pace and was out of gas before the three-furlong marker. Echo Again stopped abruptly in midstretch and was pulled up, but walked off the course.  Winning time for the 1 1/16 miles was 1:45.12, the fastest clocking among six races at the distance Saturday, albeit with a faster pace than any of them. Instant Coffee, by Bolt d’Oro out of Follow No One, by Uncle Mo, was bred by Sagamore Farm and is owned by Gold Square. He paid $4.60 to win.  The first five finishers earned Kentucky Derby qualifying points distributed 20-8-4-3-2. Instant Coffee now has 32 points in the system that determines the 20 Derby starters, a January total that already is at least close to sufficient to get him into the Derby.  “He’s a really sound horse with a good mind, and those are the two biggest things,” said Cox. Cox said he wasn’t afraid to ship Instant Coffee but was “pretty content keeping him right here” at Fair Grounds, suggesting a start next month in the Risen Star, if not the following month in the Louisiana Derby, could be in the offing.   :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.