As he headed back to his Churchill Downs barn on Monday morning following a workout by Midnight Bourbon for the Preakness Stakes, to be run Saturday at Pimlico, trainer Steve Asmussen said he began to muse to himself over “what a crazy lot we are.”

“We walked over for the Derby thinking we were going to win, it didn’t work out how we expected – ouch – and today we’re, ‘Yay, we’re going to win the Preakness,’ ” he said.

Midnight Bourbon was sixth in the Kentucky Derby after losing valuable early position. “It just wasn’t meant to be,” Asmussen said.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Mischevious Alex and Drain the Clock, locally based stars who will be heading to New York in several weeks, turned in works here Sunday. Mischevious Alex breezed five furlongs in 1:02.15, Drain the Clock a half-mile in 48.79.

Trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. had to alter his original plan for the two after his stakes winner Chance It stumbled and lost his rider leaving the starting gate for a scheduled work.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Firenze Fire’s victory in Saturday’s Grade 3 Runhappy at Belmont Park has been well documented, as well it should be, with the veteran winning the 12th stakes of his career while returning to action for the first time since his second-place finish in the Grade 3 Mr. Prospector here nearly five months earlier.

The first-time starter LS Jacks Back won a division of the Heritage Place Futurity time trials at Remington Park on Friday to set the fastest qualifying time for the $1,244,980 final on May 29.

Even with an impressive three-length win in a 350-yard trial in 17.86 seconds, LS Jacks Back may not be favored later this month. Political Rose won a division of the trials on Saturday in 17.95 seconds by 2 3/4 lengths for her second win in three starts, and could be the top choice in the richest race of the track’s winter-spring Quarter Horse meeting.

Medina Spirit, who led from start to finish in the Kentucky Derby on May 1 to post a hard-fought half-length victory, tested positive for betamethasone, a regulated anti-inflammatory, after the race, according to his trainer, Bob Baffert, who acknowledged the test result Sunday morning during a press conference on the backside of Churchill Downs.

Firenze Fire, winner of Saturday’s Grade 3 Runhappy Stakes, will likely make his next start in the Grade 2, $300,000 True North Stakes on June 4, trainer Kelly Breen said.

“The True North looks like the ideal spot off what we saw yesterday,” Breen said Sunday morning.

Firenze Fire, coming off a five-month layoff, was an easy 3 1/4-length winner of the Runhappy, for which he earned a 102 Beyer Speed Figure.

The year-end goal for Firenze Fire is the Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Del Mar in November. Firenze Fire finished third in last year’s Sprint.

Trainer Todd Pletcher said the Belmont Stakes “is in play, but not etched in stone” for both Promise Keeper and Overtook, the first- and third-place finishers from Saturday’s Grade 3 Peter Pan Stakes.

ELMONT, N.Y. - Channel Cat and Gufo, separated by a nose in Saturday’s Grade 1, $700,000 Man o’ War Stakes, are likely to meet again at some point this year, potentially as soon as June 5 in the Grade 1, $750,000 Manhattan on the undercard of the Belmont Stakes.

Jack Sisterson, trainer of Channel Cat, said his horse came out of the Man o’ War in good order and he would take him back to Keeneland, where Sisterson is based, and watch him train before deciding where to run next. Sisterson noted that Channel Cat ran in the Man o’ War just three weeks after the Elkhorn.

ELMONT, N.Y. - On the morning after he confirmed Risk Taking would join Crowded Trade in the starting gate for next Saturday’s $1 million Preakness Stakes at Pimlico, trainer Chad Brown put the two together Saturday morning at Belmont Park for their final serious workout before the race.

The California Authority of Racing Fairs is offering horsemen an incentive package for the Pleasanton meet that begins June 17.

Trainers will receive a $500 bonus for running five to nine horses during the meet. The bonus increases to $1,000 for 10+ runners.

Owners will receive a $2,000 bonus if they start five horses at the meet.

Out-of-state runners will receive a $300 bonus for both their first and second starts at the meet.

The overnight purse structure will remain at the 2020 level.