BALTIMORE – Of the 19 horses who chased home Always Dreaming in the Kentucky Derby two weeks ago, just four are back to challenge in the Preakness Stakes on Saturday at Pimlico, with their backers hoping a scenario that has played out more often than not over the last three decades returns anew.

BALTIMORE – A lot has changed in racing in the half-century since the great Damascus captured the 1967 Preakness on his way to being voted Horse of the Year, including prerace protocols.

BALTIMORE – Jim Dunleavy, the Mid-Atlantic correspondent for Daily Racing Form, was presented with the prestigious Old Hilltop Award here Thursday during the annual Alibi Breakfast. The award is presented by the Maryland Jockey Club “for covering Thoroughbred racing with excellence and distinction.”

Dunleavy has worked in a variety of roles at the Form since 1982 and most recently returned to the field in 2014 after serving more than two decades in the editorial department at several locations.

BALTIMORE – The road to a divisional Eclipse Award has run through the Preakness in 15 of the last 20 years.

Since Silver Charm won in 1997, all but five Preakness winners have been voted the top 3-year-old male of the year. The exceptions were Tiznow (2000), Summer Bird (2009), Animal Kingdom (2011), Will Take Charge (2013), and Arrogate (2016).

During the same 20-year period, the Eclipse has been voted to 11 winners of the Derby and four of the Belmont.

BALTIMORE – For whatever reason, the Preakness long has been the most formful of the three Triple Crown events, with 72 winning favorites from 142 runnings (there were two divisions in 1918), for a strike rate of 50.7 percent.

By contrast, 51 of 143 favorites (35.7 percent) have won the Kentucky Derby, and 56 of the 133 known favorites (statistics are incomplete), or 42.1 percent, have won the Belmont.

BALTIMORE – Larry Collmus has become entrenched as the premier Thoroughbred race-caller in North America, but he always feels humbled when returning home to Pimlico Race Course to call the Preakness for NBC Sports.

“This is where things started happening for me,” said Collmus.

Collmus, who grew up in nearby Ellicott City, was just 17 and a Pimlico gofer for press-box steward Eddie McMullen when he began calling races into a tape recorder. Before long, Pimlico general manager Chick Lang Sr. and his son, publicity director Chick Jr., took Collmus under their wing.

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.