JOCKEY QUOTES

JUAN HERNANDEZ, NEIGE BLANCHE, WINNER: “My filly loves the distance. You know, she loves running behind horses and that helps her to relax pretty well. Sometimes, when she’s on the outside, in the clear, she tries to run off a little bit. Today, we sat behind the pace and she relaxed well for me. I was just waiting to hit the quarter pole and find a place to run. As soon as we found a hole, she came through, picked it up really nice and we passed the leader.”

TRAINER QUOTES

LEONARD POWELL, NEIGE BLANCHE, WINNER: “I was very happy with the trip we had. We discussed with the owners and Juan before the race, we didn’t want the favorite (Queen Goddess) to get away with too much of an advantage like she did last time. We were about two to three lengths (off the pace) which was perfect, we stayed strong which was even better, and at the end of the day the last quarter of a mile the stamina of my filly played to our advantage.

“She tries really hard. The first words that Juan told me when he came back, he said, ‘Wow! She really dug in. She was trying so hard.’ He could feel her lowering herself to the ground and you can see by her demeanor that she really wanted to get there and that is a racehorse.”

NOTES: The winning owners are Madaket Stables LLC, Laura De Seroux, Marsha Naify and Mathilde Powell.