BALTIMORE – New Mexico horse owner and breeder Tom McKenna did the practically unheard of when he skipped the Kentucky Derby with Conquest Mo Money and let someone else take his spot in America’s most famous race. On Saturday, Conquest Mo Money will jump back into the pool as one of the longer prices in the Preakness.

Shotgun Kowboy is on course for a start in the Grade 3, $200,000 Lone Star Park Handicap on May 28, according to his trainer, C.R. Trout. Shotgun Kowboy was second in last year’s running won by Cyrus Alexander.

 “We’ll look at that race and see what comes in,” Trout said Wednesday. “That’s what we’re looking at, and maybe going up to Iowa for the Cornhusker.”

BALTIMORE – A race as big as the Preakness can’t be presented without all the trimmings, so, true to form, the Maryland Jockey Club will offer up seven other stakes to keep bettors entertained on another long Saturday of racing at Pimlico.

Foremost among those supporting features is the Grade 2, $250,000 Dixie Stakes, a 1 1/16-mile turf race that serves as a deserving lead-in to the second jewel of the Triple Crown.

The Iowa-bred 3-year-old filly Chanel’s Legacy is settled into trainer Lynn Chleborad’s summer base at Prairie Meadows, but Chanel’s Legacy is no typical Iowa-bred, and Chleborad is training her for the Grade 3, $200,000 Iowa Oaks on July 6.

At age 8, Hogy, improbably, appears to be in the best form of his life. But his connections know Hogy can’t stay on top forever, and while the gelding still is going so well, they are contemplating sending him to New York next month for the $300,000 Jaipur Invitational on the Belmont Stakes undercard.
“Right now, I got a couple options with him: either go to Canterbury or over to Belmont,” said Scott Becker, who trains Hogy for William Stiritz. “We’d kind of like to do some of this bigger stuff before he gets too old.”

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – The Grade 3, $100,000 Hanshin Cup last Saturday at Arlington was a career highlight for Crewman and his trainer, Dee Poulos. The 6-year-old Crewman won the first graded stakes of his career, as did Poulos, who first started a horse as head trainer in 1997.

“I’d won stakes races but never a graded stakes, so he broke the ice,” Poulos said Wednesday.

Crewman’s one-mile Polytrack time of 1:36.05 produced a 98 Beyer Speed Figure, a career best for Crewman by 12 points – not bad for a gelding making his 31st start.

Mywomanfromtokyo is at heart a route horse, not a sprinter, but for now, sprints will have to do.

The first stakes race at Prairie Meadows for older Iowa-bred females, Friday’s $65,000 Mamie Eisenhower is contested at six furlongs.

As a 3-year-old last season, Mywomanfromtokyo needed two turns to show her best. But judging from a solid second-place finish in a recent sprint allowance, the talent edge she has on her divisional rivals might be great enough to allow Mywomanfromtokyo to win at a distance short of her best.

ARCADIA, Calif. – With a purse of $500,000, the Grade 1 Gold Cup at Santa Anita on May 27 is the richest race of the track’s spring-summer meeting.

The race has drawn 20 nominations and is led by Collected, who won the Grade 2 Californian Stakes on April 22, and Midnight Storm, who was second in the Santa Anita Handicap in March. Midnight Storm was third in the Grade 2 Oaklawn Handicap on April 15.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Since reeling off three consecutive wins in overnight races last fall and winter, Moe Candy has been beaten in consecutive graded stakes in sprints, including a sixth-place finish in the Grade 3 Count Fleet Sprint Handicap at Oaklawn Park last month.

The losses do not concern trainer John Sadler as Moe Candy nears his next important race – Saturday’s Grade 2 Kona Gold Stakes at 6 1/2 furlongs at Santa Anita.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Masochistic, one of the leading sprinters in California and whose recent career has been mired in controversy, has been turned out for at least 60 days, essentially ending his 2017 campaign.

Masochistic finished 13th as the 2-1 favorite in the Churchill Downs Stakes on a wet-fast track in Kentucky on May 6. Trainer Ron Ellis said Masochistic is being given a rest at Taylor Made Farm in Kentucky.

“We’ve turned him out for a while,” he said.