Maryland Jockey Club Photo
$125,000 Federico Tesio for 3-Year-Olds to be Drawn Wednesday
David Joseph/Maryland Jockey Club
LAUREL, Md. – Stakes winners No Sabe Nada, Mid Day Image, Pyron, Determined Kingdom and Mr. Hustle are among nine older horses entered for the first grass race of the season Thursday, April 13 at Laurel Park.
The third-level optional claiming allowance for 3-year-olds and up sprinting 5 ½ furlongs scheduled for the Dahlia turf course serves as the finale for an eight-race program that begins at 12:25 p.m.
Laurel’s 142-foot-wide turf course allows for six different layouts based on the position of the portable rail, each named for some of racing’s finest champions – All Along (hedge), Bowl Game (17 feet), Kelso (35 feet), Dahlia (52 feet), Exceller (70 feet) and Fort Marcy (87 feet).
Boat’s a Rockin (Post 1) and Pyron (Post 5) each have graded stakes placed credentials. M3 Racing Stable’s Boat’s a Rockin, 6, was second in the 2022 Turf Monster (G3) last September at Parx and has gone unraced since capturing a second-level optional claiming allowance going 5 ½ furlongs on the Laurel turf Oct. 9.
Happy Got Lucky Stable Inc.’s 7-year-old Pyron, winless in two starts this year, is entered to make his first start off a $40,000 claim March 18 on the all-weather surface at Turfway Park by Laurel’s winter meet-leading trainer Jamie Ness. Pyron won the 2022 Colonel Power at Fair Grounds, has placed in four other stakes including the 2021 Palos Verdes (G3), and was fourth in the 2020 Chick Lang (G3) on the main track at historic Pimlico Race Course for trainer Steve Asmussen.
D Hatman Thoroughbreds and Kingdom Bloodstock Inc.’s Determined Kingdom won the 2022 Punch Line and 2021 Jamestown for Virginia-breds, both at Colonial Downs. Now 4, he was most recently sixth facing older horses in Colonial’s 5 ½-furlong Meadow Stable last September.
R Racing Stable’s No Sabe Nada won the 2021 First State Dash at Delaware Park and is entered to make his turf debut in his first race for trainer Ned Allard. Front-running winner of the 2021 Claiming Crown Emerald, Mid Day Image cuts back to a sprint for the first time in two years exiting a gate-to-wire triumph Dec. 7 at Tampa Bay Downs going 1 1/16 miles. Mr. Hustle, 6, won stakes on Woodbine’s all-weather and turf courses in 2019 and returns to the grass for the first time since back-to-back runner-up finishes over Laurel’s turf last fall.
$125,000 Federico Tesio for 3-Year-Olds to be Drawn Wednesday
Entries will be taken, and post positions drawn Wednesday for the $125,000 Federico Tesio to be run Saturday at Laurel Park.
The 1 1/8-mile Tesio headlines a program featuring four stakes worth $450,000 in purses on the first of back-to-back Spring Stakes Spectacular Saturdays. Also, to be drawn are the $125,000 Weber City Miss for 3-year-old fillies, $100,000 Frank Y. Whiteley for sprinters 3 and up and $100,000 Heavenly Cause for females 3 and older going one mile.
For the eighth straight year, the Tesio will serve as a ‘Win and In’ qualifier for Triple Crown-nominated horses to the 148th Preakness Stakes (G1) May 20 at Pimlico. The Weber City Miss will earn the winner an automatic berth to the 99thBlack-Eyed Susan (G2) May 19.
Fred Wasserloos, Anthony Geruso and trainer John Salzman Jr.’s Coffeewithchris was among a dozen late Triple Crown nominees made for $6,000 by the final March 28 deadline. Tesio-bound Coffeewithchris won the Heft at 2 and Miracle Wood at 3 and was most recently second in the March 18 Private Terms.
