Juvenile, Allowance Races Spice Up Saturday Program
Saturday Features Rainbow 6, Late Pick 5, Super Hi-5 Carryovers

LAUREL, MD – Lugamo Racing Stable and J R Sanchez Racing Stable’s Askin for a Baskin swept past dueling pacesetters Imperial King and Jimmy the Kid in deep stretch and edged clear in Race 9 Friday at Laurel Park to complete a four-win day for trainer Rudy Sanchez-Salomon.

Askin for a Baskin ($6.60) and Jimmy the Kid, both recent claims by Sanchez-Salomon, finished 1 ¼ lengths apart in the starter-optional claimer for 3-year-olds and up sprinting six furlongs on a fast main track, with Imperial King another 3 ¼ lengths back in third. The winning time was 1:10.98.

“It’s a blessed day. It’s an awesome, blessed day,” Sanchez-Salomon said. “It happens once in a blue moon, and it happened to me today.”

It was the first four-win day for Sanchez-Salomon, a 50-year-old native of Mexico who by Equibase statistics has won 135 races since launching his career in 2017 after working under trainers Scott Lake and Dane Kobiskie. He won his first race with Nairet May 28, 2017 at historic Pimlico Race Course.

“I thought the horses were in some good spots and with some luck we could win a couple races,” Sanchez-Salomon said. “In the last race, they scratched the favorite and that horse is a runner. That was in our favor.”

Stroll Smokin, a 13-time winner including two straight, was scratched after warming up for Race 9, where the 7-year-old gelding was the 2-5 favorite. Jimmy the Kid and Imperial King were inseparable through splits of 23.04 and 46.35 seconds when Askin for a Baskin, who had tracked the pair in third, came rolling on the far outside.

“It feels awesome,” Sanchez-Salomon said. “The horse that ran second I just claimed not that long ago and I like that horse. He’s got speed and heart, as well. He was in a battle and the other horse was going good and I said, ‘He’s got a shot to win this one.’ It’s a great day.”

Sanchez-Solomon’s other wins came with Designated Hitters Racing’s Albertano ($26.80) in Race 4, J R Sanchez Racing Stable’s Samui Sunset ($17.80) in Race 6 and Joanne Shankle’s The Wolfman ($3.40) in Race 8, a six-furlong starter allowance for 3-year-olds and up. The Wolfman came back five days after running ninth in the $75,000 Find going 1 1/16 miles on the Laurel turf.

“The other day, he just went over there just to go around. That was my plan. It was time to figure out if he was going to like the turf going long or not,” Sanchez-Salomon said. “I told the jockey, ‘Listen, just let him run his race. Don’t ask him for anything. Let him be himself,’ and he did. He proved it today that he was ready for this race.”

Sanchez-Salomon now has six wins from 23 starters at Laurel’s 37-day summer meet, which began June 3. He was second with Can the Queen in the $75,000 All Brandy June 19 while attempting to stretch the two-time turf sprint stakes winner’s speed around two turns.

Based at Laurel, Sanchez-Salomon said that claimer-turned-multiple stakes winner Shake Em Loose, a late Triple Crown nominee that was considered for a start in the 147th Preakness Stakes (G1), remains on summer vacation. He was most recently sixth in the one-mile James W. Murphy for 3-year-olds on turf on the Preakness undercard May 21.

“He’s doing good,” Sanchez-Salomon said. “He’s taking some time off at the farm. I wanted to give him a little bit of time off and he’s doing awesome.”

Juvenile, Allowance Races Spice Up Saturday Program

A half-dozen juveniles, five of them making their first start, will sprint five furlongs over the main track in a maiden special weight that is among the highlights of Saturday’s 10-race program at Laurel Park.

Trainer Lacey Gaudet entered the pair of Ice Cold Frosty and Quincy Café. Five Hellions Farm’s Ice Cold Frosty, purchased for $100,000 at Ocala’s 2-year-old in training sale in March, was scratched from a June 3 maiden special weight at Laurel. The Cross Traffic colt has been breezing since mid-April at Laurel for his debut.

Gaudet also has K E M Racing Stable’s Quincy Cafe, a son of Mendelssohn that fetched $140,000 out of the same sale his stablemate. Like Cross Traffic, who won the 2013 Whitney (G1) on dirt, Mendelssohn was a Grade 1 winner, taking the 2017 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf.

Ice Cold Frosty drew the rail under jockey Jevian Toledo, while Quincy Cafe will have apprentice William Humphrey aboard from Post 4.

Tiz No Clown, a Maryland-bred owned and trained by William Earl Atkins, is the only horse to have raced previously, with two starts. Last out, he finished first by 1 ½ lengths May 12 in a 4 ½-furlong maiden special weight at historic Pimlico Race Course but was disqualified to third after bearing in from his outside post shortly out of the gate.

Race 9 Saturday is an entry-level allowance for fillies and mares 3 and up scheduled for 1 3/8 miles on the All Along turf course. Two shippers that figure prominently are Creative Cairo for trainer Christophe Clement and Jonathan Thomas-trained Song of Innocence.

Brereton C. Jones’ homebred Creative Cairo went unraced at 2 and won one of five starts at 3 before going to the sidelines last summer. The Cairo Prince filly returned from nearly nine months away to be fourth in a one-mile off-the-turf allowance May 8 at Belmont Park.

Song of Innocence, bred and owned by George Strawbridge Jr.’s Augustin Stables, has raced three times this year and been second in each of the last two – a 1 ½-mile optional claimer that came off the Gulfstream Park turf Feb. 10 and a 1 1/16-mile allowance over Woodbine’s all-weather surface April 30 where the daughter of Munnings was beaten a head as the favorite.

Notes: Jockey Horacio Karamanos registered a hat trick Friday aboard Dream Happy ($10) in Race 2, Gerrys Gem ($8) in Race 3 and Blue Collar Boom ($5.20) in Race 5. Both Gerrys Gem and Blue Collar Boom are trained by Damon Dilodovico … Family, friends and members of the Maryland jockey colony gathered in the winner’s circle after Race 6 in honor of the late Al Little, who worked as a valet in Maryland for riders such as Forest Boyce, Horacio Karamanos, Yomar Ortiz, Calixto Juarez, Lauralea Glaser and Richard Monterrey over the years … There will be carryovers in the 20-cent Rainbow 6 ($10,160.26), 50-cent Late Pick 5 ($9,616.78) and $1 Super Hi-5 ($792.04) for Saturday’s 10-race program that begins at 12:40 p.m.