Lemon Muffin leads field of 8 in Friday's Black-Eyed Susan

Grade 3 winner Lemon Muffin will face four fellow stakes winners as well as Grade 2-placed California shipper Corposo in a highly competitive milestone edition of the $300,000 Black-Eyed Susan (G2) on Friday at Pimlico.

Lemon Muffin can will look to repeat her performance in the 1 1/16-mile Honeybee (G3) Feb. 24 at Oaklawn Park, her maiden triumph after racing five times previously with four consecutive runner-up finishes. By multi-millionaire Collected, who won five graded-stakes including the 2017 Pacific Classic (G1), she graduated by 3 1/2 lengths at odds of 28-1.

After the Honeybee, Lemon Muffin ran seventh in the Fantasy (G2) at Oaklawn and, most recently, eighth in the 1 1/8-mile Kentucky Oaks (G1) May 3, both won by Thorpedo Anna.

Trainer D. Wayne Lukas has had the most Black-Eyed Susan starters since 1976 with 18 and is tied with former protégé and fellow Hall of Famer Todd Pletcher for the most wins with four, the most recent coming with Serena’s Song in 1995.

“She has her days when she's up and down and everything. On her best day, she's a very, very nice filly,” Lukas said of Lemon Muffin. “But she doesn't always show up every time, so we're hoping that we get one of those days when she does.”

Flavien Prat is named to ride from Post 3 in a field of eight at topweight of 124 pounds, yielding from two to six pounds to her rivals.

Call Another Play earned an automatic bid to the Black-Eyed Susan thanks to a 3 1/2-length victory in the 1 1/16-mile Weber City Miss on April 20 at Laurel Park, her third consecutive win.

“It was good. I was very happy with her,” trainer Mike Trombetta said of her stakes debut. “She had a real good chance in there if she ran her race, and she probably did a little better than we expected.”

Maryland’s leading rider in 2023, Jaime Rodriguez, has been aboard for the entirety of her win streak and returns from Post 4 on Call Another Play, who ran twice for a $40,000 tag before her breakthrough victory.

“She just finally caught some continuity and she’s figuring things out in these two-turn races. She’s been able to handle it,” Trombetta said. “She’s going to have to step up her game, it’s just a matter of how much.”

Jeanne Marie ran second in the Weber City Miss, her second straight race around two turns following a front-running triumph in the one mile, 70-yard Main Line on March 5 over her home track of Parx. Her trainer, Butch Reid Jr., ran sixth with Morning Matcha in the 2022 Black-Eyed Susan.

“She’s a tough little filly,” Reid said. “She’s not very big, about 900 pounds I think she weighed last time. She kind of had to check back a little bit on the turn and then came on again and was finishing well at the end. That was her second time around two turns, so we expect her to even improve off that one.”

Mychel Sanchez has the call from Post 1.

Ringy Dingy is entered to make her season debut in the Black-Eyed Susan for trainer Danny Gargan. The Dialed In filly raced four times at 2, breaking her maiden second time out and pulling away to a 6 1/4-length score in the one-mile White Clay Creek last fall at Delaware Park. She has not raced since running seventh in the 1 1/8-mile Demoiselle (G2) over a muddy Aqueduct surface Dec. 2.

Regular rider Katie Davis, formerly based in Maryland, has the assignment from Post 2.