Less than a week ago, trainer Greg Gilchrist said that it was “the bottom of the ninth” for his champion sprinter Lost in the Fog, diagnosed with terminal cancer. But at his Golden Gate Fields stable Thursday, the rally caps were out.

Returning to his barn after spending the previous five days in Florida for the Ocala Breeders’ yearling auction, Gilchrist said Lost in the Fog is being treated in his stall with medications designed to shrink two football sized tumors found in his spleen and beneath his spine along his back, as well as a third, smaller mass. The trainer said he was encouraged by the 4-year-old colt’s feistiness.

“This horse is not done yet,” he said. “We are trying to shrink the tumors if that would be possible. If we can shrink them 50 percent,  there’s a chance we can remove them (surgically). It’s a long shot but long shots happen all the time in this game. It’s something to hang on to. We’re not dead in the water yet.”

It was almost exactly a year ago that an unbeaten Lost in the Fog romped to a 4 3/4-length win in the King’s Bishop (gr. I) at Saratoga for his ninth straight win to give Gilchrist and owner Harry Aleo their first grade I triumph. Lost in the Fog stretched his winning streak to 10 before losing for the first time in the TVG Breeders’ Cup Sprint (gr. I) at Belmont Park on Oct. 29