Long-idle Lenape Rim seeks to win Lyphard Stakes for third time
Lenape Rim will try to win the $100,000 Lyphard Stakes at Penn National for the third time Saturday night, but it might not be easy. Lenape Rim, 8, will be returning from a six-month layoff after going winless during a calendar year for the first time.
The Lyphard is a 1 1/16-mile turf race for Pennsylvania-breds. It is the first stakes of the season at Penn National, which will hold its biggest night of the year June 4. That card will be topped by the Grade 3, $500,000 Penn Mile and will include the $200,000 Mountainview Handicap, the $200,000 Penn Oaks, and the $150,000 Pennsylvania Governor’s Cup.
Lenape Rim, trained by Michael Salvaggio Jr., has won five statebred stakes over the years. She finished second, beaten a length, in the Lyphard last year and won the race in both 2014 and 2012.
Although she didn’t win a race last year, Lenape Rim was competitive in all but one of her six starts. She also runs well fresh. Lenape Rim came into the last two runnings of the Lyphard off similar breaks and fired both times.
Lenape Rim has been an honest performer since beginning her career for Salvaggio as a 2-year-old in 2010. She won her debut that year in a Pennsylvania-bred $15,000 maiden claimer and has gone on to compile a 41-10-9-6 record while earning $538,000.
Royal Renege, who outfinished Lenape Rim to win the Lyphard last year for trainer Elizabeth Merryman, is also part of the 12-horse field. She tuned up for this with a second-place finish in a second-level optional turf sprint at Laurel Park. Royal Renege raced in tight quarters in the stretch of that race and seemed to just be finding her best stride at the finish.
Other contenders include the Todd Pletcher-trained Rock Me Again; Parx-based Devilish Love, who will make her first start for trainer Lupe Preciado; and the speedy R Frosty One, trained by Eduardo Rojas.