Time means nothing unless you’re in jail is an old racetrack adage.

Proponents of that saying, whether it be a final time of a race or what the stopwatch reads after a breeze, would be hard-pressed to pooh-pooh Sidney’s Candy’s sensational turf work Sunday morning at Saratoga.

The Candy Ride colt sizzled through 5 furlongs in :57 3/5, galloping out 6 furlongs in 1:09 3/5.

Following the drill, a longtime clocker told me that he never timed a horse who galloped out 6 furlongs that rapidly on the turf at the Oklahoma training track

“It’s a course record,” chuckled clocker Chris O’Connor.

O’Connor then told me a funny story about my father from the 1990s. A claimer he trained, Same Old Wish, sped through a half in :44 on the Oklahoma turf.

As my father walked by the clockers’ stand, he quietly said: “You’re not going to burn me on that one, are you?”

Not sure if Dad meant don’t publish the correct work because he wanted to make a tidy score at the windows or if he didn’t want to get reamed by the owner for working the horse too fast.

I suspect it was the latter because Dad wasn’t a big bettor. If he did wager on Same Old Wish, I probably was the beneficiary of a shopping trip with Mom. I looked back at the gelding’s past performances, and noticed he won twice at Saratoga in 1993. Once at odds of 7-1.

Sometimes time does matter.

The Coaching Club American Oaks will be run for the 95th time later this afternoon at Saratoga.

Among the greats who have won this 3-year-old filly fixture on the NYRA calendar — Ruffian, Open Mind, Chris Evert, Lite Light, and Davona Dale, just to name a handful.

Something tells me that this year’s winner will too leave her mark as one of history’s top race horses.

Each of the 5 runners have won graded races; three of them are Grade 1 winners. California shipper Plum Pretty won the Grade 1 Kentucky Oaks; Joyful Victory took Oaklawn Park by storm this winter; It’s Tricky blew the doors off her competition in the Grade 1 Acorn; and the late developing Buster’s Ready won her first stakes in the Grade 1 Mother Goose in dominating fashion.

But I’m going with the beautifully bred Royal Delta.

The daughter of Empire Maker out of the A.P. Indy mare Delta Princess jumped from a first-level allowance race to win the Grade 2 Black-Eyed Susan on May 20 in her last start. She is returning to the races today from a forced freshening needed to heal a hoof bruise.

I spoke to her Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott on Friday and he said his filly is training super for her return to the races. Mott had hoped to run Royal Delta in the Mother Goose on June 25 at Belmont Park but the hoof issue KO’d that plan.

I like the fact that she hasn’t run since the 3rd week in May, and believe that will be to her advantage.