ELMONT, N.Y. – Switching the remainder of the Churchill Downs meet to Ellis Park had a trickle-down effect on the stakes action this weekend at Belmont Park after trainer Rusty Arnold made a last-minute decision to supplement and run Red Carpet Ready in Thursday’s $150,000 Jersey Girl Stakes. The presence of Red Carpet Ready in the six-furlong Jersey Girl, off her game victory over odds-on Munnys Gold five weeks earlier in the Grade 2 Eight Belles, bolsters a lineup that also includes Grade 1 winner Chocolate Gelato and the lightly raced but up-and-coming Aunt Becca.

ELMONT, N.Y. – Trainer Chad Brown has won four of the first nine runnings of the Grade 2, $200,000 Wonder Again Stakes and with three of the eight entrants in Thursday’s 10th renewal, he stands a good chance to win it again.

Revalita, beaten less than a length in two graded stakes in the 3-year-old filly turf division this year, heads the Brown trio that includes Venencia and Prerequisite.

ELMONT, N.Y. – As a 2-year-old, National Treasure was a bit behind his more brilliant, perhaps more precocious stablemates such as Cave Rock and Arabian Knight.

At the time, trainer Bob Baffert hinted the best was still to come for National Treasure.

“By spring he’s going to be this really nice horse,” Baffert said last fall.

While Cave Rock has yet to run at 3 and Arabian Knight has only raced once this year, National Treasure has made his mark in the division with his gutsy Preakness victory on May 20.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – The durable millionaire Silent Poet scratched out of a tough spot last Sunday in favor of Thursday’s seventh race, a five-furlong inner-turf dash combining conditioned allowance types with $50,000 claimers.

Silent Poet has been the most successful turf sprinter at Woodbine the past five years, winning the Grade 1 Highlander in 2021, the Grade 2 Connaught Cup and Grade 2 Nearctic in 2020, and the Grade 2 Play the King in 2019.

While Churchill Downs begins conducting the remainder of its spring-summer meet at Ellis Park this Saturday, turf racing at Ellis will not begin until June 15, according to a notice sent to horsemen. Thus, the $225,000 Mighty Beau Stakes for older turf sprinters, which was to have been run Saturday, has been moved to June 18. It will be run at 5 1/2 furlongs, a slight change from the original five furlongs, to accommodate the different course. Nominations were re-opened for the race, which originally closed May 27.

Gun Runner hinted at talent as a 2-year-old, was a Grade 2 winner and third in the Kentucky Derby early in his 3-year-old campaign, and became a Grade 1 winner toward the end of that season. But as an older horse, he was nearly untouchable, ending his career on a streak of five Grade 1 wins and voted the 2017 Horse of the Year for co-owners Winchell Thoroughbreds and Three Chimneys and trainer Steve Asmussen.

Trainer Kenny McPeek looked loaded for bear with his 2-year-olds at the end of 2021. Rattle N Roll won the Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland, and Smile Happy took both his starts at Churchill Downs, including the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club, stoking additional hopes of success back under the twin spires the following spring. But neither colt made an impact on the 2022 Triple Crown trail.

ELMONT, N.Y. – At the beginning of the season, the prospects for success in this year’s Triple Crown seemed bright for trainer Brad Cox whose 38 nominees were the most of any trainer in this year’s series.

After going winless with four starters in the Kentucky Derby and unable to have a runner in the Preakness, Cox will hope for a change of fortune when he sends out a trio of runners in the 155th Belmont Stakes on Saturday at Belmont Park.

ELMONT, N.Y. – Nine days after claiming Penner Ash out of a winning effort for $50,000, trainer Carlos Martin is returning the 4-year-old colt to the races at a longer distance and with a change of equipment.

Martin has entered Penner Ash in a $65,000 starter allowance for horses that have started for a price of $50,000 or less and are also eligible for a first-level allowance condition. The 1 1/8-mile turf race serves as the feature on a nine-race Sunday card at Belmont Park.