Inspired, who has won three of her last four starts, looks like the one to catch on Friday in the $100,000 The Very One Stakes, a five-furlong grass race for older female sprinters that drew a bulky field of 11.

Inspired will benefit by the cut back to five furlongs after fading to fourth going 5 1/2 furlongs in the Giants Causeway at Keeneland on April 21. She led from start to finish in her three prior races, all wins. She is the 2-1 favorite on the morning line of Pimlico’s Frank Carulli.

BALTIMORE – Trainer Graham Motion thought by choosing to run his Grade 1 winner Toby’s Corner in Friday’s reincarnated Pimlico Special he might be ducking some of the better horses in the handicap division.

Problem is, there appears to be so much depth to the division this year, that the Grade 3, $300,000 Pimlico Special – being run for the first time since 2008 – came up just as tough as any Grade 1 race that will be run later in the year.

Trainer King Leatherbury hopes Ben’s Cat continues his trend as a copycat.

Last year, Ben’s Cat won the Mister Diz Stakes, got roughed up when fifth in his next start, and rebounded to win the $100,000 Jim McKay Stakes on Preakness eve.

BALTIMORE – The ladies’ day theme coinciding with the Kentucky Oaks has proven wildly popular at Churchill Downs, and Pimlico is proving it’s a concept worth imitating, albeit in a somewhat different form. This will be the third year that the Lady Legends for the Cure for retired female jockeys will be run as a parimutuel race on Preakness eve, and once again the participants are champing at the proverbial bit.

“I’m very excited,” said Mary Wiley-Wagner, who won the Lady Legends last year aboard Miss Destruction. “It looks like it’s going to be a really, really good race.”

There doesn’t appear to be a clear-cut favorite in a $22,000 claiming race that will serve as Friday’s feature at Northlands Park. The six-furlong sprint for 3-year-olds and up drew seven horses, including the 7-year-old mare Salsa Express, who will be competing with males for the first time in her career.

BALTIMORE – Rudy Rodriguez has been very methodical in the way he has campaigned Agave Kiss to this point. He began her career in races for New York-breds, stayed on the inner dirt at Aqueduct during the winter, and ventured outside of New York for the first time last month, when Agave Kiss won a stakes race at Parx Racing.

She is a perfect 5 for 5, all at six furlongs. One more intermediate step, and then it will be time to aim really high.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – When Southern Parkway stylishly won a maiden race in his third race last fall at Keeneland, he looked like a horse with the potential to win a stakes race. However, six months later no stakes wins have followed, neither has even a single allowance victory – but at least that could change if the horse runs to expectations in Friday’s 10th race at Churchill Downs, a $55,300, first-level allowance for 3-year-olds at 1 1/16 miles on turf.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Hard Not to Like, who is one of the leading candidates for the June 3 Woodbine Oaks, could bypass that $500,000 race and head straight to the June 24 Queen’s Plate.

Owned and bred by Garland Williamson, Hard Not to Like finished second when making her 3-year-old bow and Polytrack debut in Keeneland’s Ashland on April 22 and was trying dirt for the first time when a troubled sixth in the May 4 Kentucky Oaks.

“She ran really hard in the Ashland,” said trainer Gail Cox. “When she was back in Kentucky for the Oaks, it was 85 degrees every day.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Bear’s Ruckus, who had an eventful but successful debut, will go 1 1/16 miles in his second career start Friday at Woodbine, in an Ontario-sired allowance for 3-year-old nonwinners of two.

Bear’s Ruckus was dismissed at 9-1 as part of a Bear Stable entry when he debuted in a contentious Ontario-sired maiden special April 27. After getting bumped at the break, the large gelding fought for the lead off the rail on the backstretch in that 6 1/2-furlong sprint, but then lost ground while blowing the turn.

Gypsy Robin led every step of the way to win the $100,000 Inaugural at Presque Isle Downs on opening day Tuesday evening.

Trained by Wesley Ward, Gypsy Robin had a two-length lead at the first call of the six-furlong event. Jockey Julio Garcia shook the reins at the 3-year-old filly in the stretch and she drew off to win by four lengths in ridden-out fashion. The even-money favorite Brilliant Katie was second, a half-length in front of longshot Mali in third.