Flashy Dresser entered Saturday's $75,000 Rushaway Stakes as a promising maiden winner. More significantly, he exited it as a stakes winner, and perhaps a potential player on the Triple Crown trail.
Castaway prompted the pace set by Majestic Stride, then overtook that one en route to a clear win in the first division of the Grade 3, $250,000 Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn Park on Monday. Jake Mo rallied for second, while Reckless Jerry was third.
Follow the 2011 Triple Crown with this schedule of key prep races. Race results include winning Beyer Speed Figures, charts, and video replays.
Business figures for the Preakness Stakes and its undercard on Saturday were a mixed bag, with an increase in handle on the race but a decrease on the card.
Shackleford isn't going to be remembered as a great Preakness winner, or even an above-average Preakness winner. Yet give the colt credit: he's a gutsier fighter than the vast majority of horses who may have more raw ability.
The connections of Dialed In missed out on a huge payday as their colt’s late run fell 4 1/4 lengths short in Saturday’s Preakness Stakes at Pimlico, but trainer Nick Zito is still proud of the colt.
Disappointment, fresh, was “a bitter pill,” said Graham Motion, who had just watched Animal Kingdom, the Kentucky Derby winner he trains for Team Valor International, come within a half-length of running down Shackleford in a dramatic 136th running of the Preakness.
136th Preakness Stakes Pimlico Race Course, May 21, 2011 Order of finish:
Shackleford found the distance of the Kentucky Derby just a bit too far two weeks ago, but the wire came up just in time for him going a shorter distance Saturday in the 136th Preakness Stakes. Shackleford held off Animal Kingdom, the Kentucky Derby winner, to capture the second leg of the Triple Crown on a gorgeous afternoon at Pimlico Race Course.
On a day when Life At Ten showed she is still far away from her Grade 1-winning form of a year ago, trainer Todd Pletcher may have found someone to take her place in the distaff division as Super Espresso, an 11-1 outsider, rallied four wide in the stretch to win Saturday’s Grade 3, $100,000 Allaire DuPont Distaff Stakes by three-quarters of a length at Pimlico.
