Ward, Corrales win three, including the restricted $300,000 Tapit

Trainer Wesley Ward and jockey Gerardo Corrales teamed up to win three races Wednesday at Kentucky Downs. Those were Kentucky Downs wins number 33, 34, and 35 for Ward, but Corrales, a 24-year-old native of Panama, never had ridden the track before this week, much less won a race. Ward has shown plenty of confidence in Corrales, using him extensively during the Keeneland meet in July, and Corrales put an assertive ride on Ramsey Solution, his third winner, to take down the featured $300,000 Tapit Stakes.

Get Western set the pace in the Tapit, a mile and 70-yard race restricted to horses who hadn’t won a 2020 stakes race, and Corrales forwardly positioned Ramsey Solution, but even as the race unfolded at a solid tempo, Corrales moved early with Ramsey Solution, taking over from Get Western with about three furlongs left to race.

The bold move proved prudent. Ramsey Solution traveled strongly through the long Kentucky Downs homestretch and hit the wire one length in front of the nearest pursuer. That was longshot Midnight Tea Time, who was a half-length better than third-place Hembree. English Bee, the tepid 3-1 favorite, finished a head farther back in fourth.

Ramsey Solution, a Kenneth and Sarah Ramsey homebred by Real Solution out of Dynarhythm, by Dynaformer, paid $18.20 to win.

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Ward and Corrales earlier on the card won a 2-year-old maiden race with the filly Royal Approval, who was impressive notching a 5 1/4-length victory, and with Infinite in a $20,000 claiming race. Ward after the Tapit called Corrales a “rising star.”

Ramsey Solution won for the fourth time in seven starts and was ambitiously placed in the Tapit having finished fourth last out in a Saratoga allowance race. That race, however, was won by Digital Age, who returned to land the Grade 1 Turf Classic last weekend at Churchill, and Ward said he’d long thought highly of Ramsey Solution.

“I really can’t believe the horse didn’t win last time at Saratoga. I always thought a lot of this guy. He had a little knee issue – we took a chip out, and after he was fractious in his first race, we gelded him.” Ward said. “Since then, he was destined to do something good, and he did.”

Ward thinks Ramsey Solution can still do better, too. Tentative plans call for a start in the Grade 1 Shadwell Turf Mile next month at Keeneland. Don’t be surprised if Corrales keeps the mount.