Lithe Spirit notches fourth consecutive win with Queen Stakes
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Lithe Spirit scored her fourth consecutive win, and her second stakes victory this year, on Saturday with a triumph in the $125,000 Queen Stakes for female sprinters at Turfway Park.
Lithe Spirit ($8.70) and Joe Ramos were aided by a competitive pace up front. The top four horses were within heads of one another through a sharp opening quarter of 21.87 seconds as Lithe Spirit was unhurried in sixth.
She worked her way to third, essentially under her own power, at the quarter pole as Moonlit Lady, who emerged from the scramble with a half-length lead, was beginning to flag. Lithe Spirit's position gave her first run on favored Nice as Pie, who was fifth entering the stretch after a troubled start. Lithe Spirit kicked away in midstretch, but then had to hold off a late run from Get Twisted, who had been 10th of 11 after the hot opening quarter. The margin was a neck at the wire.
The final time for the six furlongs on the Tapeta was 1:10.29.
After Get Twisted, it was a length back to Awesome Treat, who edged Nice as Pie by a neck for third.
Lithe Spirit, who is trained by Steve Asmussen for Bradley Thoroughbreds, Gainesway, Laura Leigh Stable, Scott Estes, and Cambron Equine, has now won five of her last six outings, dating to an allowance win last August sprinting five furlongs on Indiana's dirt track.
Two months later, the Speightstown filly finished sixth going a mile on the turf there. Since then, she has been clipping along at a steady beat, winning allowance-optional claiming races on Oct. 29 sprinting on Indiana's turf, and on Dec. 21 on Turfway's Tapeta. She made her stakes debut in the Wishing Well Stakes on Jan. 25 at Turfway, pouncing from fourth and easily holding sway by 1 1/4 lengths over Nice as Pie.
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