ST CATHERINE, Jamaica - In another commanding effort, champion two-year-old of last season Mojito, showing his known class, easily brushed aside rivals to win the 30th running of the $1.75 million Prince Consort Stakes feature race at Caymanas Park on Sunday.

Running for the first time in little over three months, Mojito, ridden by Dane Dawkins, surrounded horses at the top of the lane and hit the wire by 5 lengths in the Graded Stakes event for native-bred three-year-old colts and geldings over seven furlongs (1,400m). Mojito won the event, which was one of the major prep races on the "Road to the Triple Crown," in a smooth 1:26.2.

The Richard Azan trainee didn’t get the best start at the break as Mojito raced among behind the early pacemakers in mid-pack and watched as Big Guy In TheSky (Raddesh Roman) led the field ahead of Loyal Action (Matthew Bennett), Milos (Youville Pinnock), and Rejected Raja (Robert Halledeen) down the backstretch.

Mojito continued to bide his time well until approaching the half-mile (800m) turn, when he began to round horses going into the bend. The grey colt then hit the front full of running at the top of the stretch and went about his business to register his third consecutive win from five career starts. Rejected, Raja ran the race of his life to finish second, ahead of Milos in third place. Splits were 23.3 x 47.0 x 1:11.2.

It was the second winner on the nine-race card for both Azan and Dawkins. Azan had earlier saddled Eazy Peazy (Reyan Lewis), who won the sixth race via steward’s room, while Dawkins won aboard Rambling Rose for trainer David Lee Sin in the third race.

Racing continues on Monday with a 10-race programme. First post is at 11:45 am.

Ruddy Allen