Win Win Win to Ship to Churchill Downs April 24

Riding momentum as leading trainer of Laurel Park's current spring meet, trainer Mike Trombetta will ship record-setting stakes winner Win Win Win to Kentucky April 24 to finish preparations for the May 4 Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve (G1).

Trombetta's plans include giving Win Win Win, ranked 16th with 50 Derby qualifying points, one final work at Churchill Downs over the weekend.

Win Win Win is based with Trombetta at Fair Hill Training Center in Elkton, Md., where the Live Oak Plantation homebred colt breezed five furlongs in 1:01 over the all-weather track Easter Sunday, a day later than scheduled.

"He's good," Trombetta said. "We had to postpone the work Saturday. It rained really, really hard up there, so we postponed it until yesterday and worked him yesterday morning. He worked a good five-eighths. It looks like we're going the middle of this week. I think we're going to ship him Wednesday, and then he'll get his final work there on Sunday."

Sunday marked Win Win Win's return to the work tab for the first time since closing to finish second behind Vekoma in the Toyota Blue Grass Stakes (G2) April 6 at Keeneland. In his prior start, the son of Hat Trick was third to Tacitus in the Lambholm South Tampa Bay Derby (G2) in his graded debut. He is scheduled to face both race winners in the Derby.

Win Win Win won each of his first two starts before running second to Preakness Stakes (G1)-bound Alwaysmining in the Heft Stakes—all at Laurel Park—to close his 2-year-old season. He launched his 3-year-old campaign with a 7 1/4-length romp in the Pasco Stakes Jan. 19, breaking Tampa Bay Downs' seven-furlong track record in 1:20.89.

Julian Pimentel, aboard for each of his three victories as well as the Heft, will make both his Derby and Churchill debut aboard Win Win Win.

This will be the second trip to the Derby for Trombetta, a career winner of 1,741 races and more than $56 million in purse earnings. He finished seventh with post-time favorite Sweetnorthernsaint in 2006. Sweetnorthernsaint would go on to run second in the Preakness Stakes.

"It's cool," Trombetta said. "No one knows if we're ever going to make it at all, and to be able to get a second crack at it is a lot of fun."