Stolis Winner punched his ticket to the Grade 1, $350,000 Challenge Championship at Los Alamitos in October on Sunday, when he closed for a half-length win over 3-5 favorite Streakin Down in the Grade 2, $100,000 Oklahoma Challenge Championship at Remington Park. 

It was the first win since last July for Stolis Winner, a World Champion at 2 who in December became Quarter Horse racing’s all-time leading earner after finishing third in the Grade 1 Challenge Championship at Fair Grounds.

The percentages are stacked against horseplayers who insist on trying to beat horses from the potent trainer-owner combinations of Jamie Ness-Midwest Thoroughbreds and Tony Dutrow-Mercedes Stables.

According to DRF’s Formulator, Ness and his main client, Midwest Thoroughbreds, have gone 30 for 72 (42 percent) over the past 30 days.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Awesome Patriot ran the best race of his career in Sunday’s $72,960 Alydar Stakes at Hollywood Park, a performance likely to lead to a graded stakes in coming weeks.

Awesome Patriot led throughout the Alydar Stakes over 1 1/8 miles, holding off Uncle Sam to win by three-quarters of a length in 1:50.52, his first stakes win. The first two finishers are trained by Bob Baffert, who was absent from Hollywood Park on Sunday, remaining at Churchill Downs following Saturday’s Kentucky Derby.

INGLEWOOD, Calif - A $5,000 win bet was placed in a Las Vegas casino seconds before the start of the fifth race at Hollywood Park on April 24, resulting in a significant odds drop on eventual winner Ninth Infantry, according to a report released by the California Horse Racing Board.

OLDSMAR, Fla. - Trainer Gerald Bennett sent out two winners on Sunday’s closing-day program to tie Jamie Ness for the training title for the 2010-11 racing season at Tampa Bay Downs.

Bennett, who trailed Ness by as many as 15 wins earlier in the meeting, finished strong in the final weeks when he sent out 11 winners from his last 25 starters to deadlock for the title with 61 wins.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario— Stunning Stag came rolling in the lane from off a rapid pace to win the $174,900 Vigil Stakes going away at Woodbine on Sunday.

It was the first start of the year for Stunning Stag, who raced well back in the early stages of the seven-furlong sprint. Essence Hit Man set fractions of 22.12 and 43.84 seconds while being chased by favored Hollywood Hit, last year’s ultra-impressive winner of the Grade 3 Vigil.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Pants On Fire, the Louisiana Derby winner who finished ninth in Saturday’s Kentucky Derby, was found to have bled in the race and will not point to any of the remaining Triple Crown races, trainer Kelly Breen said Sunday morning.

 “He bled a significant amount. We are not going to the Preakness,’’ Breen said. “We are going to try and heal him up inside out. My main goal right now is in three months is the Haskell.’’

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Nehro, the runner-up to Animal Kingdom in Saturday’s Kentucky Derby, will likely skip the Preakness and point to the Belmont Stakes, owner Ahmed Zayat said Sunday morning.

 “I would prefer, as of now, to run in the Belmont and maybe the Haskell and then we’ll see,’’ said Zayat, who added that his primary objective is to return to Churchill Downs in November for the Breeders’ Cup Classic. “We’ll take it a day a time, but we’re probably going to point him to the Belmont. [The Preakness] is a possibility, but not probable.’’

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- Dialed In, who finished eighth as the favorite in Saturday’s Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs, will come right back in two weeks for the Preakness Stakes, a situation that would mean a victory in that race would be worth far more to him than to the Derby winner, Animal Kingdom.

Dialed In won both the Holy Bull Stakes and the Florida Derby at Gulfstream Park earlier this year. That made him eligible for a $5.5 million bonus from MI Developments, the parent company of both Gulfstream and Pimlico, if he were to also win the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico on May 21.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- Though admittedly “shocked” that he won America’s most-famous race, trainer Graham Motion, a British expatriate, on Sunday morning had recovered enough to start focusing on the May 21 Preakness Stakes, which he said would be the next start for Animal Kingdom, the upset winner of Saturday’s 137th Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs.

“I never anticipated winning the Derby, so it’s a lot to take in,” Motion said Sunday morning at Churchill Downs. “Yesterday was surreal.