Dixiana Farms' homebred Hayes Strike along with Mendelssohns March, owned by Harold Lerner, Nehoc Stables, AWC Stables, and Team Stallion Racing Stable, tuned up for expected starts in Saturday's $1-million Toyota Blue Grass (G1) by working five furlongs in 1:00.60 in company over a fast main track at Keeneland Sunday morning.
Hayes Strike, a Connect colt, comes into the 1 1/8-mile Blue Grass off a victory in the Private Terms Stakes at Laurel on March 18.
“I don't run many horses in Maryland,” trainer Kenny McPeek said of Hayes Strike, who has two graded stakes-placings. “His race at Turfway (in the Leonatus Stakes on Jan. 21 in which he finished ninth) … nothing went right. He didn't ship well, and he didn't handle the synthetic surface at all. I just needed to get him back on the dirt and get him back to winning.”
Hayes Strike is a half brother to Senior Investment (by Discreetly Mine), who won the 2017 Stonestreet Lexington (G3) at Keeneland for McPeek.
“Senior Investment needed a mile and an eighth, and his brother is the same,” said McPeek, who also plans to run R.T. Racing Stable and Cypress Creek Equine's Sun Thunder in the Blue Grass. Sun Thunder finished fifth in the Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby (G2) on March 25 in his most recent start.
Mendelssohns March, a Mendelssohn colt, has two wins from two starts, with victories on the turf at Fair Grounds and on a sloppy dirt track at Oaklawn Park.
McPeek is the most recent of six trainers to have swept the Central Bank Ashland (G1) and Toyota Blue Grass in the same year. He accomplished the double in 2002 with Take Charge Lady and Harlan's Holiday and is expected to send out Magdalena Racing, Colette Marie Vanmatre, and James Ball's Defining Purpose in Friday's Ashland. Defining Purpose worked five furlongs in 1:00.20 Sunday morning.
The post McPeek-Trained Hayes Strike, Mendelssohns March Tune Up At Keeneland For Blue Grass appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.
