Unchained Melody on schedule to start in Alabama

Trainer Bryan Lynch sent his Grade 2 Mother Goose winner Unchained Melody to the main track under Joel Rosario for a breeze Friday morning following the maintenance break. The 3-year-old filly by Smart Strike was joined by Belmont Stakes runner Meantime and Joe Bravo to her inside for a four-furlong breeze from the gate in 1:01.78.

"I thought it was a good little work," Lynch said. "She's ready to run the same day as [Meantime], so I just wanted to let her have a nice work with him. He hadn't run in a while, and I wanted to have a nice gate drill, but I wanted her to have a gate work where she can just sit off another horse and relax if she's got to, and the boys did a nice job with it."

Unchained Melody is on schedule to start in the Grade 1, $600,000 Alabama onAugust 19. Meantime will be entered for an allowance race on the same card.

"Meantime is no slouch and it was a nice little tune-up work for her. She sat back off him and joined him nice around the turn, and Joel was happy with the work," Lynch said. "He's going to regroup; we're going run on the same day."

Unchained Melody owns three wins from four starts with the Mother Goose as the best effort yet in her young career. Her front-running style helped her wire the field of six others in the race, and projects to help her along in the Alabama as well.

"I thought that race had a lack of speed in there, and she has a nice cruising speed so I said to Joel, 'If she breaks well, and she's comfortable on the lead, then don't be afraid to leave her where she is.' I think that she ran a pretty quick first quarter there, and that's one of her assets. I think she has a bit of early speed, she can open up a little bit, and then she relaxes, and then she has such a high cruising speed she can maintain, and she seems to have a good wind capacity. She had enough gas in her to kick again."

Source: NYRA Communications