Belmont Park: Effie Trinket scores in Diamondrella Stakes

Owner Patsy Symons and trainer Rick Violette enjoyed a lot of success with the New York-bred filly Gitchee Goomie, who won five stakes before retiring at the end of last year.

In Effie Trinket, Symons and Violette may have found her replacement.

Effie Trinket, a 3-year-old, New York-bred daughter of Freud, won her second straight race on turf Sunday, taking the $100,000 Diamondrella Stakes by 1 1/4 lengths at Belmont Park.

Effie Trinket is 4 for 7, with two wins on dirt, two wins on turf, and restricted stakes victories on both surfaces.

Even though Effie Trinket won twice on dirt last summer at Saratoga, Violette thought her future would be on turf after breezing her on that surface.

“I breezed her on the grass once with Gitchee Goomie, and she outworked Gitchee Goomie,” Violette said.

Effie Trinket didn’t fare well in two turf routes last fall. Both of her wins this meet came sprinting on turf.

On Sunday, with Rosie Napravnik up, Effie Trinket sat right off Fearless Jacq through a quarter in 23.64 seconds and a half-mile in 46.88. Effie Trinket took over just outside the eighth pole and held off a drifting-out Bella Castani – the even-money favorite – to earn the victory.

“Her last race, she settled behind horses and made a run,” Violette said. “Today, there was only one filly with any kind of speed. Rosie did a perfect job of putting her in the right spot. She’s pretty adaptable. I’ll have to think about stretching her out at some point. Sprinting at Saratoga is 5 1/2 [furlongs], and I don’t know that I want to do that.”

Effie Trinket covered the seven furlongs in 1:21.23 and returned $11.60 as the third choice in the six-horse field.