Jeannine Edwards honored at Alibi Breakfast

BALTIMORE – Jeannine Edwards, who worked as an in-house television anchor for the Maryland Jockey Club tracks at the outset of her brilliant 22-year career as a racing and sports reporter, was honored Thursday morning with the Special Award of Merit at the annual Alibi Breakfast in the Pimlico clubhouse.

Edwards worked as an exercise rider, jockey, and assistant trainer prior to entering the television field. She retired early this year.

Previous honorees of the Special Award of Merit, which dates to 1989, include Jim McKay (1991), Steven Crist (1999), King Leatherbury (2004), and Ramon Dominguez (2014).

Other breakfast honorees were Chris Dachille, executive sports producer at WBAL-TV, the Old Hilltop Award; Tom Law, the David F. Woods Memorial Award for best Preakness story of 2017; and Rick Buckley, the Jerry Frutkoff Preakness Photography Award.

Also, Edgar Prado, who earlier this week notched his 7,000th career riding victory, was named Honorary Postmaster. Prado spent much of his Hall of Fame career on the Maryland circuit.

Chalk dominant in Preakness

There have been 142 runnings of the Preakness, and a little more than half of them (72) have been won by favorites, according to the Maryland Jockey Club media guide. The last winning favorite was American Pharoah ($3.80) in 2015, preceding defeats for Nyquist at 7-10 in 2016 and Always Dreaming at 6-5 last year.

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Although Justify surely will be an odds-on choice this year, he most likely won’t threaten the record of the two lowest-priced favorites in race history, Citation (1948) and Spectacular Bid (1979), both of whom returned 10 cents on the dollar, or $2.20 for a $2 win bet. The lowest winning mutuel since Spectacular Bid was $2.40 on Big Brown in 2008.

The longest shot to win the Preakness is Master Derby, who paid $48.80 in 1975.

Big multi-race pools Saturday

The Preakness, the 13th of 14 Saturday races, is the final leg in a pair of multi-race wagers with seven-figure guaranteed pools. Pimlico is guaranteeing a $2 million pool in the late pick four (races 10-13) and a $1 million pool in the late pick five (races 9-13).

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Last year, handle for those wagers was $2,665,640 in the pick four and $1,869,866 in the pick five.

Earlier Saturday, there also will be pool guarantees of $500,000 for the middle pick four (races 6-9) and $250,000 for the early pick five (races 2-6). Last year, handle on those respective pools was $877,039 and $405,127.