O'Prado Again Strikes in Remsen

In the Grade 2, $200,000 Remsen Stakes for juveniles, O’Prado Again stayed well behind a moderate pace before launching a wide rally through the stretch that carried him to a three-quarter-length victory over Souper Speedy.

O’Prado Again, a recent maiden winner at Keeneland trained by Dale Romans, was content to track Souper Speedy and Our Entourage as they dueled through an opening quarter of 24.38 and a half in 49.97. Given his cue by Hall of Fame jockey Kent Desormeaux with a quarter-mile to go, the gray son of El Prado charged through the stretch to take command inside the eighth pole and pulled away to hit the wire in 1:52.07.

“He’s a horse you can move into a spot and sit again, which is characteristic of a serious horse,” said Desormeaux. “He’s got gears. He’s silky smooth, like [Fusaichi Pegasus] was. You can’t tell his feet hit the ground. He’s really, really smooth.”

Sent off at 7-1, O’Prado Again returned $16.80 for a $2 win bet as he extended his record to 2-0-1 from five starts and earned $120,000 for Donegal Racing.

“I think he’s a special horse,” said Romans by telephone from Kentucky. “We went [to the Remsen] for the extra distance. The further he goes, the better he gets. We pointed to the Remsen not so much because of how he ran in his last race, but because of the way he trained into the last race and way he trained after it. The light really came on for him. He was training so well that we thought he would run a big race, so we decided to run in the Remsen.”

Finishing third, a head behind Souper Speedy, was favored El Padrino. Done Talking, Our Entourage, Managed Account, Stephanoatsee, Speightscity, Mucho Mas Macho and Scatter a Star completed the order of finish.