Texas Wildcatter battled for the lead with My Pal Charlie through fractions of 24.88, 48.83, and 1:13.08, while Pyro sat about 2 lengths off them in third. Turning for home, jockey Shaun Bridgmohan took Pyro 3-wide for room. Pyro easily passed the pacesetters at the 3/16 pole and drew off to win by 1 3/4 lengths over My Pal Charlie in 1:43.53. It was another 1 1/4 lengths back to Visionaire third, while favorite Recapturetheglory, who was unhurried early, ran into traffic and could not rally, finishing fourth.
Winning jockey Shaun Bridgmohan said, "Obviously, he's tactical and he's so classy. You can do whatever you want with him. Steve and his crew did a fabulous job. He's been a temperamental horse, but he was fabulous today. The work that they've put into him has, obviously, paid off."
Trainer Steve Asmussen added, "The horse left there very cleanly today and Shaun had him in great position. He ran a very strong race. Pre-race, he was very confident and back to how he was over the winter. Hopefully this is the first step to a very good second half of the year. He was coming off two extremely disappointing efforts for a top-class horse. This was a quality field today and he handled what was thrown at him. He was a lot sharper in the race and looked comfortable the whole time."
Results chart from DRF
