Help me pick a phono, pre and cart

Beware of the potential Grado HUM.

Going with a full-fledged preamplifier would make a lot of sense.
Try the Sutherland Engineering N1 https://sutherlandengineering.com/products/n1/
Owners Manual  https://sutherlandengineering.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Sutherland-N1-OwnersManual.pdf

I've had mine for over a year now and haven't looked back! Drives long interconnects without issue as long as they don't behave strangely. 

Happy hunting

@jetson Well nobody else has said it, so if it's not too late, I will... I'd suggest giving more serious consideration to alternatives to a VPI. This is coming from someone who for a number of years owned a VPI TNT6HR(Basically the more discussed/reviewed HRX with the TNT plinth) and JMW12.7 arm, a combo of much higher performance than the VPIs you're considering and was happy with it at the time. My experience as leader of a local audio club (just a stone's throw from VPI!) let me listen to > a dozen VPIs including all variations of Classics and Primes in real world systems. In more cases than I'd care to detail, performance was mediocre. More than once users had mis-manufactured components with issues such as reversed internal wiring in mini DIN-to-RCA block. Others had speed variations that they didn't know were there until friends encouraged strobe testing. A number of users sold their VPIs and moved in varying directions. None ever regretted the change, nor moved back to VPI product. 
IMHO, day-to-day focus from Sheila & Harry were what led to the great reputation that VPI earned. Sheila was one helluva nice lady and passionate about getting things right for her customers. Harry is obviously a great engineer, and cut through much BS in the market(e.g. his stance on anti-skate on his arms). I don't know what involvement he has at this time, but anecdotes indicate that he is more-or-less in an advisory role and perhaps still doing some design. Other than a couple of longtime fanboys who usually jump in every thread with the same repeated comments(hello @Stringbean, lol), I don't get the sense that the majority of their large customer base with newer models is as thrilled as in the past. 
With your budget, you've got plenty of potential directions to go. If you land on a $2k phono stage, $1k cartridge & $1k for 2 cables, you've got about $6k for table and arm. You could consider for example:
- Vintage refurbished direct drive tables like Technics SP10mk2(about $3-4k totally refurbished) tougher to find top 70s-80s tables from Kenwood or Pioneer)
- New tables like the new DD Technics
- If you prefer other belt drive tables: Sota(also made in USA), Acoustic Solid or Avid. 
Not to rain anyone's parade, but their are lots of options out their that offer reliable quality that give IMHO superior performance at the price points discussed. Cheers,
Spencer

If in doubt, an excellent turntable with arm is the Technics SL1200G. Very non-resonant, speed is spot on, easy to set up.