Vertical Oak opens Preakness 2018 weekend stakes with Skipat win
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Photo:
Maryland Jockey Club
J. Kirk and Judy Robison’s Vertical Oak dueled with fellow graded-stakes winner Ms Locust Point from the gate into mid-stretch before pulling away in the final furlong for a 1 ½-length victory in the $100,000 Skipat Stakes Saturday at legendary Pimlico Race Course.
The 25th running of the Skipat for fillies and mares 3 and older was the first of seven stakes, four graded, worth $1.15 million in purses on a spectacular 14-race Black-Eyed Susan Day program that served as a fitting prelude to Saturday’s 143rd Preakness Stakes (G1).
Ridden by Ricardo Santana Jr. for Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen, Vertical Oak ($4.60) ran six furlongs in 1:10.35 over a sloppy and sealed main track. It was the second win in as many tries at Pimlico for Vertical Oak, who earned her first career graded-stakes triumph in the Adena Springs Miss Preakness (G3) last May before going on to take the Prioress (G2) last fall at Saratoga.
Ms Locust Point, winner of the Barbara Fritchie (G2) in February at Laurel Park, set fractions of 23.03 and 46.31 seconds while pressed to her outside by Vertical Oak. The two leaders turned for home and raced together until Vertical Oak edged clear past the eighth pole, as Startwithsilver snuck through an opening along the rail to edge Ms Locust Point for second.
The Skipat and the $100,000 Caplan Brothers Glass Jim McKay Turf Sprint kicked off the renewed Mid-Atlantic Thoroughbred Championship (MATCH) Series, an assortment of 25 races at tracks in Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania which originally debuted in 1997 and ran for five years.
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