Cort's P. B. ran like a 124-pound highweight should, winning the $45,000 Big Earl Handicap in impressive fashion. Pacesetter Majestic Commander finished second with Zarb's Dahar reporting home third. Odds-on favorite and second highweight Brother Bean forced the issue for just over three furlongs and then gave way to finish fourth and last. Margarita Man and Mr. Canaveral were late scratches.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - When Spin Master won an allowance race in fast time this February in Florida, he looked like he might become a stakes sprinter. It just took him a few more months of development to show it.

Saturday in the $108,500 Matt Winn Stakes at Churchill Downs, Spin Master rebounded from a ninth-place finish in the Grade 2 Hutcheson Stakes on March 3, scoring a 2 3/4-length victory under Miguel Mena in stakes-record time.

FORT ERIE, Ontario - After the initial two weeks of the Fort Erie meeting, Ralph Quaranta and John Simms are tied atop the trainer standings with identical records of three wins and a third from seven starts.

Both raced during the off-season. Quaranta competed at Chicago's Hawthorne Park, while Simms did his business at Tampa Bay Downs.

Quaranta arrived at Hawthorne on Oct. 4. With 15 horses, he scored nine times by the meet's end on Jan. 1. He went back Feb. 23 when Hawthorne opened a new meeting, but was blanked.

BALTIMORE – Flashy Bull outlasted Hesanoldsalt through a stretch-long battle to score a nose victory in the Grade 3, $100,000 William Donald Schaefer Handicap for older horses on Saturday at Pimlico.

Ryan's For Real was a distant third.

Flashy Bull ($8.40), under jockey Alan Garcia, completed 1 1/8 miles on the fast main track in 1:47.86 for his fourth win in 17 lifetime starts. Kiaran McLaughlin trains Flashy Bull, 4, for West Point Thoroughbreds.

By DAVID GRENING

BALTIMORE, Md. - A bad post draw and an iffy weather forecast had trainer Angel Penna Jr. seriously contemplating not shipping Remarkable News down to Pimlico from New York for Saturday's $250,000 Dixie Handicap.

But the way the horse was acting - and his belief that it wouldn't rain - prompted Penna to come. And is he ever glad he did.

BALTIMORE - Remarkable News bounded to victory at 6-1 in the Grade 2 Dixie Stakes on Saturday at Pimlico in a race marred by a breakdown leaving the half-mile pole by the front-runner at the time, Mending Fences, who was ridden by Eddie Castro.

BALTIMORE - Chelokee lived up to his 1-5 favoritism, taking the lead entering the far turn and drawing off to a convincing win the $100,000 Barbaro Stakes at Pimlico on Saturday.

Chelokee is trained by Michael Matz, who was also the trainer of Barbaro, the 2006 Kentucky Derby winner who broke his right hind leg a furlong out of the gate in last year’s Preakness. Barbaro fought bravely for survival, though he succumbed to laminitis and had to be euthanized on Jan. 29. Maryland Jockey Club officials changed the name of this race from the Sir Barton.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – True Metropolitan, last year’s champion older male and the runner-up for Canadian Horse of the Year, has shipped from Vancouver to Woodbine for Monday’s $150,000 Eclipse Stakes.

The Grade 3 race, scheduled for 1 1/16 miles on the Polytrack, has drawn an all-star cast that includes three other Canadian champions – Shillelagh Slew, Palladio, and Judiths Wild Rush.

BALTIMORE - Michael Matz had run horses at Pimlico since last year's Preakness Stakes, but not until Saturday had he actually set foot in the place since Barbaro's tragic injury.

"It didn't present itself for me to come back," Matz said.

The occasion to return proved a far happier one, because Matz sent out heavily favored Chelokee to a popular victory in the first running of the $100,000 Barbaro Stakes.

BALTIMORE - Setting the stage for Preakness drama, Flashy Bull outgamed Hesanoldsalt in a sensational stretch-long duel Saturday in the Grade 3 William Donald Schaefer Handicap, the lead-in race to the 132nd Preakness at Pimlico Race Course.

With Flashy Bull racing near the rail and Hesanoldsalt right alongside, the two fought tooth-and-nail for the entire stretch, with Flashy Bull, ridden by Alan Garcia, emerging as the best by a head.