Maker, former assistant Sharp go head to head Sunday

LEXINGTON, Ky. – In each of the first four races Sunday at Keeneland, Mike Maker and his former assistant, Joe Sharp, both have scheduled starters. Maker has the morning-line favorite in every one of those races, while Sharp has the second choice in three of the four.

Sharp has enjoyed an extraordinarily hot start to his training career since going solo last September, having won with 48 of his first 183 starters (26 percent) while steadily expanding his roster of clients.

Maker is as impressed as anyone with how Sharp has done, but he feigned being scared when asked about the four head-to-head matchups.

“You’d think he could’ve called or told me what he was entering,” Maker joked. “That way, I could’ve entered somewhere else.”

After the first four races, Sharp has entries in two more races Sunday (races 6 and 8), and Maker has one (race 5).

** It’s not exactly the Sports Illustrated cover jinx, but just as soon as Kiaran McLaughlin got some publicity in the racing press by starting off April with a torrid 12-for-20 streak, he ran a combined four starters Wednesday and Thursday with results that weren’t quite as good.

McLaughlin had three runners at Keeneland, and all were beaten favorites: Taghleeb, fifth at 2-1; Sayaad, eased at 2-1; and Strike Tone, third at 6-5. In addition, his lone starter at Aqueduct on those days was Whale Rock, second at 13-10.

** Veteran jockey Robby Albarado ended a drought when booting home I’m a Looker (6-1) and Simon Bar Sinister (9-1) on the final three-race span of the Thursday card. Albarado, a winner of more than 4,700 races and a four-time Keeneland riding champion, had gone 33 races without a winning mount up until then, including his first 30 mounts at this spring meet.