Private Terms One of Four Stakes March 14 at Laurel

Next to Turfway Park, Laurel Park will have the next busiest day of stakes action across the country on March 14 with four stakes on dirt worth $100,000 apiece. On tap are the Nellie Morse Stakes for fillies and mares 4 and up at a mile, the Beyond The Wire Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at the same distance, the Harrison E. Johnson Memorial Stakes at 1 1/8 miles for older horses, and the Private Terms Stakes for 3-year-olds at about 1 1/16 miles.

Second in Laurel's series of sophomore stakes, the Private Terms and Beyond The Wire serve as respective preps for the $200,000 Federico Tesio Stakes and $125,000 Weber City Miss Stakes April 18. The Tesio is a 'Win and In' race for Triple Crown-nominated horses to the $1.5 million Preakness Stakes (G1) May 16, and the Weber City Miss earns the winner an automatic berth in the $250,000 Black-Eyed Susan Stakes (G2) May 15, both at Pimlico Race Course.

Colts Neck Stables' stakes winner Big City Bob, unraced since finishing third behind Triple Crown contender Tiz the Law in the Champagne Stakes (G1) last fall, is set to kick off his 3-year-old season in the Private Terms as the 2-1 morning-line favorite.

By 2012 juvenile champion Shanghai Bobby, he will be trying two turns for the first time since winning the one-mile Sapling Stakes last September at Monmouth Park. Rather than run in last weekend's Gotham Stakes (G3) in New York, a one-turn mile, trainer Jorge Duarte Jr. opted to give the colt some extra time and distance for his seasonal debut.

"He had a little setback after the last race, nothing bad. He spent some time in Florida and then came back up to us," Duarte said. "It made more sense to run here with the two turns, and the timing was better. We just think he'll run good at Laurel with the way the track plays. It'll give us a good line to see where we're at and hopefully move forward to the Tesio or something like that."

Jevian Toledo will ride.

Euro Stable's Lebda exits a front-running triumph in the one-mile Miracle Wood Stakes Feb. 15 at Laurel, a race where he took a seven-length lead into the stretch and held off Mine Not Mine by three-quarters of a length. It was the first race of the year for Lebda, who finished third in the Dec. 28 Heft Stakes at Laurel and in Churchill Downs' 1 1/16-mile Iroquois Stakes (G3), won by Dennis' Moment.

"He came out good from the last race. I was very happy with that race because he went very fast. He went in 22 and 45 [seconds] and he continued. In the end he slowed down, but it was because he went the first half of the race so fast," Laurel's winter meet-leading trainer Claudio Gonzalez said. "I believe he's going to be OK with a mile and a sixteenth."

Alex Cintron will have the mount on the Raison d' Etat colt, the co-second choice in the race at 5-2 with speedy New York invader Took Charge.

The three other stakes precede the Private Terms, which goes as the 10th race on an 11-race card.

The Nellie Morse begins the stakes action in the fifth race, where Arrifana is favored in her first start as a 4-year-old after closing out her 3-year-old year with a second in the Comely Stakes (G3). The Curlin  filly, favored at 9-5, has won four of five races for trainer Kelly Rubley and owners Gainesway Stable, LNJ Foxwoods, and Millennium Farms.

The Beyond The Wire follows in the seventh race, a contest in which Toledo has secured another quality ride aboard Naughty Thoughts, a 3-year-old daughter of The Factor  that has steadily developed into a stakes winner after trainer Jonathan Maldonado and owner Rafael Lopez claimed her from a $25,000 race last year.

Then a couple of races later, the back-in-form Alwaysmining races for Rubley and jockey Julian Pimentel in the Harrison E. Johnson Memorial. Derailed after racing in last year's Preakness, where he was 11th, the 4-year-old Runnymoore Racing-owned Stay Thirsty  gelding has won two consecutive local stakes.

Entries: Nellie Morse S.

Laurel Park, Saturday, March 14, 2020, Race 5

• STK
• 1m
• Dirt
• $100,000
• 4 yo's & up Fillies and Mares
• 3:13 PM (local)

PP	Horse	Jockey	Wgt	Trainer	M/L
1	1Victim of Love (KY)	Weston Hamilton	122	Todd M. Beattie	9/2
2	2Arrifana (KY)	Julian Pimentel	120	Kelly Rubley	9/5
3	3Jennemily (KY)	Alex Cintron	120	Steven M. Asmussen	7/2
4	4Lady Banba (KY)	Sheldon Russell	120	John C. Servis	20/1
5	5Horologist (NJ)	Angel Suarez	122	Richard Baltas	9/2
6	6Bye Bye Bertie (KY)	Trevor McCarthy	120	Hamilton A. Smith	10/1
7	7Needs Supervision (KY)	Feargal Lynch	124	Jeremiah O'Dwyer	6/1

Entries: Beyond The Wire S.

Laurel Park, Saturday, March 14, 2020, Race 7

• STK
• 1m
• Dirt
• $100,000
• 3 yo Fillies
• 4:12 PM (local)

PP	Horse	Jockey	Wgt	Trainer	M/L
1	1Princess Cadey (KY)	Angel Cruz	118	Claudio A. Gonzalez	4/1
2	2Mama's Grey Ghost (KY)	J. D. Acosta	118	Anthony Farrior	12/1
3	3Naughty Thoughts (MD)	Jevian Toledo	118	Jonathan Maldonado	5/2
4	4Bella Aurora (VA)	Julian Pimentel	118	Michael J. Trombetta	7/2
5	5Ankle Monitor (KY)	Alex Cintron	118	Claudio A. Gonzalez	5/1
6	6Miss Tap Dance (KY)	Trevor McCarthy	118	Jamie Ness	8/1
7	7Long Point Beach (MD)	Charlie Marquez	118	Lacey Gaudet	10/1
8	8She'smysunshine (MD)	Angel S. Arroyo	118	Herold O. Whylie	10/1

Entries: Harrison E. Johnson Memorial S.

Laurel Park, Saturday, March 14, 2020, Race 9

• STK
• 1 1/8m
• Dirt
• $100,000
• 4 yo's & up
• 5:12 PM (local)

PP	Horse	Jockey	Wgt	Trainer	M/L
1	1Senior Investment (KY)	Emmanuel Esquivel	120	Scott A. Lake	6/1
2	2Alwaysmining (MD)	Julian Pimentel	124	Kelly Rubley	2/1
3	3Name Changer (KY)	Jevian Toledo	120	Jorge Duarte, Jr.	4/1
4	4Forewarned (OH)	Angel S. Arroyo	122	Uriah St. Lewis	12/1
5	5Someday Jones (PA)	Trevor McCarthy	124	John C. Servis	5/2
6	6Bonus Points (MD)	Feargal Lynch	122	Michael J. Trombetta	15/1
7	7Wait for It (PA)	Johan Rosado	120	Edward J. Coletti, Jr.	6/1

Entries: Private Terms S.

Laurel Park, Saturday, March 14, 2020, Race 10

• STK
• About 1 1/16m
• Dirt
• $100,000
• 3 yo
• 5:43 PM (local)

PP	Horse	Jockey	Wgt	Trainer	M/L
1	1My Friends Beer (MD)	Feargal Lynch	118	Jeremiah O'Dwyer	12/1
2	2Lebda (KY)	Alex Cintron	122	Claudio A. Gonzalez	5/2
3	3Amen Corner (KY)	UNKNOWN	118	Jeremiah O'Dwyer	20/1
4	4Big City Bob (KY)	Jevian Toledo	122	Jorge Duarte, Jr.	2/1
5	5Mine Not Mine (MD)	Sheldon Russell	118	Brittany Russell	5/1
6	6Awesome Party (KY)	Trevor McCarthy	118	Todd A. Pletcher	15/1
7	7Took Charge (KY)	Julian Pimentel	118	Chris J. Englehart	5/2