Ward Sends Out Pair for Royal Palm Ascot Qualifiers

2025 marks the third year that Gulfstream Park will host the Royal Palm Juvenile and Juvenile Fillies stakes, the only two juvenile Royal Ascot qualifying races in the country. Contested over five furlongs on the turf May 10, the Royal Palm Juvenile and Juvenile Fillies offer the winner an automatic entry into one of Royal Ascot's six prestigious juvenile races. In addition to the automatic berth, the winning connections also receive a $25,000 travel stipend to help cover the costs of sending the horse to England. The series has proven largely successful since its 2023 inauguration. Crimson Advocate, winner of the 2023 Royal Palm Juvenile Fillies, traveled abroad to triumph in the Queen Mary Stakes (G2) while last year's Royal Palm Juvenile victor, Gabaldon, was narrowly beaten when running second in the Windsor Castle Stakes. Wesley Ward, the winningest United States-based trainer at the Royal Ascot meet with a total of 12 wins, will send out his homebred Fuzzy Stare in the Juvenile and Hat Creek Racing's Satisfied Mind in the Juvenile Fillies. "It should be a good race for both horses," Ward said. "I'd say the filly (Satisfied Mind) should be shooting out of there and going, she's extremely quick. (Fuzzy Stare), he can be a little tactical, I'd say." Fuzzy Stare is one of nine first-time starters to draw into the body of the 12-horse field. The Hootenanny gelding ships southward off a series of quick drills at Keeneland. Emisael Jaramillo has the call. Jose D'Angelo, trainer of Gabaldon, will look for a return ticket to England with the unraced Raging Bull (FR) colt Ciborio and the Florida-bred Fear, third in his April 18 Keeneland debut for Arindel. An overflow field of 12 also assembled for five-furlong Juvenile Fillies, led by Keeneland first-out winners Satisfied Mind and Lennilu. Satisfied Mind, a daughter of First Samurai, went gate to wire in a 4 1/2-furlong maiden special weight on the dirt for Ward. She garnered a field-high 87 Equibase Seed Figure for her debut victory. "I always thought she was going to be a grass filly," Ward said. "This race was always in mind from the onset for her second start. "She's a talented filly. She won off only a few works. She should move forward for having had that race in not only fitness, but seasoning underneath her." Emisael Jaramillo will ride Satisfied Mind. Lennilu, trained by Patrick Biancone, rallied from the off the pace to take her debut by one length over a sloppy track going 4 1/2 furlongs at Keeneland. "We were very happy with her performance," Biancone said of the Leinster filly. "The idea was to run there and if everything goes right we would follow the program. "She ran a very good race that day and she came back good. We learned that she's a very good traveler, too, because she handled it very well. All was perfect." Biancone will also saddle another filly in Saturday's race with the unraced Emerald Ember. Both Lennilu and Emerald Ember are from the first crop of graded stakes-winning turf sprinter Leinster, who stands at Pleasant Acres Stallions near Ocala, Fla.