True Cinder heads filly trio vs. boys in Horizon Stakes

True Cinder keeps facing new challenges with aplomb, winning her turf debut last time out to stretch her winning streak to five races. She will look to keep rolling as she faces males in the $75,000 Horizon Stakes for Ohio-accredited 3-year-olds on Sunday on the Belterra Park turf.

True Cinder had to beat only three horses for the third stakes victory of her career in the Cincinnatian Stakes last month, but her challengers made her work for it, as she dug in gamely when headed and edged clear to win by three-quarters of a length. She had won her four previous races – including last year’s Glacial Princess Stakes at Mahoning Valley and the Dr. T.F. Classen Memorial Stakes at Thistledown in May – by a combined 24 1/2 lengths.

True Cinder drew post 3 in the 1 1/16-mile Horizon for owner and trainer Michael Rone and will have regular rider Rex Stokes III in the irons.

Sugar Lane and Grizabella, second and third in the Cincinnatian, also come back to face males in the Horizon. Sugar Lane has only a maiden win to her credit in seven career starts but gave the favorite all she could handle in the Cincinnatian, getting to even terms at the eighth pole before ceding grudgingly. Grizabella came out of the Cincinnatian to finish fifth in the Queen City Oaks on the main track last out and gets back on turf here.

The three fillies appear well spotted to again contend here. The only other entrants with more than a maiden win are Ol’ L B, with an allowance win, and Byers Beware, with a victory in a claiming race. True Cinder is the only horse in the field to have won on turf.