Gold Phoenix © Benoit Photo

A nifty pair of Grade II stakes – both offering free rides to major Breeders’ Cup races – top a 10-race program Saturday at Del Mar on Day 26 of the seaside track’s 32-day summer session.

Going as Race 10 on the card is the $300,000 Del Mar Handicap Presented by the Japan Racing Association, a mile and three-eighths marathon that is one of the track’s “original” races and is being presented for the 87th time. The marathon has drawn a field of 11, headed by the 8-year-old ace Gold Phoenix, who’ll be trying for – hold tight here – a record-setting fifth consecutive victory in the feature, something that no horse in any race has managed previously at Del Mar.

In the race before the ‘Cap, 10 horses will hook up going seven furlongs in the 41st edition of the Pat O’Brien Stakes with a $250,000 lure helping to bring them on board. The dash appears wide open with five or six of the runners solid candidates to take down the prize, though old pro Big City Lights looms a lukewarm favorite.

The Del Mar ‘Cap guarantees its winner an automatic admission into this year’s $5-million Breeders’ Cup Turf at a mile and one half. The Pat O’Brien Stakes gives its champion an automatic entrance into the $1-million Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile. Both of those races will be run at Keeneland on Saturday, October 31.

Gold Phoenix, who is owned by the partnership of Agave Racing Stable and Little Red Feather Racing, warmed up for his fifth go-round in the ‘Cap by pulling off a minor upset in the Eddie Read Stakes at Del Mar on July 26. It was the chestnut gelding’s 13th victory and pushed his bankroll to $2,587,087. The veteran is trained by grass specialist Phil D’Amato and will once again be ridden by Hector I. Berrios.

Big City Lights, a full 7-year-old horse who races out of the barn of Hall of Fame conditioner Richard Mandella, comes into the dash off back-to-back tallies in sprints at Santa Anita this spring. The veteran is a nine-time winner with more than $700,000 in the bank and will once again be handled by rider Kazushi Kimura.

First post for the Saturday session will kick off at the usual 2 p.m.