Memorial Day weekend features Washington State Legislators Stakes at Emerald Downs | Horse Racing

Defending champion Gadget Queen and the No Flies On Doodle head a list of eight fillies and mares nominated to the $50,000 Washington State Legislators Stakes on Monday, May 31.

Defending champion Gadget Queen and the No Flies On Doodle head a list of eight fillies and mares nominated to the $50,000 Washington State Legislators Stakes on Monday, May 31.

The 6 ½ furlong stakes highlights a four-day racing week, Friday thru Monday, that culminates with special holiday racing on Memorial Day.

Gadget Queen, 28-8-9-3-$243,960, set a stakes record of 1 minute, 14 3/5 seconds in the 2009 Washington State Legislators Stakes. She rallied for a three-length victory over top-class runners like High Resolve and Elusive Horizon , the latter would earn honors as the meet’s Top Older Filly or Mare. Gadget Queen is trained by Blaine Wright and owned by John and Janene Maryanski, who also are represented by Hallelujah Trail.

A razor-sharp Gilded Time filly, Hallelujah Trail, 10-4-3-1-$106,850, has done everything but win in her three starts this year. At Santa Anita, she finished second and fourth in a pair of sprints, the latter a grudging one-length defeat in the Grade III Las Flores Handicap. And her local debut was a runner-up effort to No Flies On Doodle in the six-furlong Hastings Handicap on May 2.

No Flies On Doodle, 9-6-2-0-$133,552, simply refuses to lose. The Keith Swagerty homebred is 2-for-2 this season, 6-for-9 overall and has won stakes races short and long. In the Hastings, she wrestled the lead from Clair Annette on the turn and held off Hallelujah Trail to win by 1-¾ lengths in a stakes record 1:08 1/5.

Clair Annette, 17-8-1-2-$113,563, continues to hold good from at age 7. Voted Top Claimer of 2008 and a double stakes winner in 2009, the mare finished a respectable third in her 2010 debut and she’s won over half her starts at Emerald Downs (7-for-13).