Tom’s Ready working at Churchill Downs on April 23rd – Coady Photography
Louisiana Derby (gr. II) runner-up Tom’s Ready turned in his final pre-Kentucky Derby workout at Churchill Downs on the morning of April 29th, going five furlongs in a rapid :59.40 seconds.
Trained by Dallas Stewart, who went out Golden Soul and Commanding Curve to finish second in the 2013 and 2014 Kentucky Derbies, Tom’s Ready breezed in company with Forever d’Oro, starting five lengths behind his workmate and posting sharp fractions of :23.80 and :36 flat before finishing in :23.40 under a bit of urging to edge his workmate by a head. He continued past the wire through six furlongs in 1:13.20 and seven furlongs in 1:27.20.
Tom’s Ready was ridden by exercise rider Emerson Chavez, and his time was the third-fastest of 52 five-furlong workouts at Churchill on Friday morning.
“He gets eager when he goes head to head and this way, he can ease up to them on the turn,” Stewart was quoted as saying in a Churchill Downs press release. “This was a good work.”
