151ST PREAKNESS STAKES MEDIA CONFERENCE

May 16, 2026

Al Gold

Chad Summers

Paco Lopez

Laurel Park Racetrack

Media Conference

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: All right, we're going to get started here as Chad Summers is going to take a seat. We have two-thirds of the winning connections of Preakness 151 as Paco Lopez still hasn't arrived here in the nightcap from Laurel Park. On the left here, if you're facing the stage, trainer Chad Summers; and to his side, owner Al Gold here, the connections of Napoleon Solo. I will open this up for a couple of questions. I'm Ashley Mailloux. We'll start with questions down here. Al, you were sitting here first, you have been here for a while so I wanted to start with you and just your thoughts of this performance especially as you watched the race unfold with the fractions.

AL GOLD: Does anybody think this horse can go this far? Anybody? Got one person.

CHAD SUMMERS: He didn't pick us in the top four.

AL GOLD: Oh, he didn't? And the second thing I want to say before we start anything else, Billy, we got Louie here. A few months ago we thought Louie was gone, and he's here. We talked about this for a while, and that's the best thing. So we have him to join us.

The thoughts of the race, Paco ran a perfect race. I said before, he was the one who told Chad in the Wood that we should come here. I didn't think this horse could go this far.

It was all Paco deciding and his training, and Chad was very enthusiastic about this for -- is that the right word, enthusiastic? -- for the last month since the Wood. And was determined then, and he worked three quarters and ten flat, and he was awesome in training, and we were just worried he can go this far.

We knew at a mile, nobody could beat him, not this group, anyway. And we were very happy. That's it. I don't know what the question was; I was just rambling.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Al, you watched Paco watch the replay again, kept on looking over his shoulder to see if anyone was there. Is that when you had confidence?

AL GOLD: Eight times he looked over his shoulder.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Did you have confidence seeing that, that you felt like he had horse underneath him?

AL GOLD: Yes, I had confidence. I was watching, turned around and looked eight different times.

I have hearing aids; I can't hear you. I have trouble hearing him this close.

He was awesome, Paco. What else can you say? Perfect ride. He waited to the right time to move. And he slowed it up from the half to the three quarters perfectly, and he just saved a lot of horse. And very impressive. Chad and Paco together was the perfect exacta.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Move to the trainer, Chad Summers. When you watched the opening quarter, any concerns with where they were going that quick?

CHAD SUMMERS: No, that was kind of our plan. We just kept -- the more we looked at it, we said there's a lot of speed in the race. But the fractions that they run aren't really speed fractions. They're 47s and 48s. We felt like his biggest asset is his cruising speed. He has a high cruising speed. You saw it in the Champagne when he was at his best.

And we just hoped somebody would give us a little target in front. We were planning, if nobody else went there, then we would have been 22 and 4 and in front. That was the plan. We weren't going to take his biggest asset away from him.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: His two-year-old season was brilliant. With the way he was training up to the Preakness, did you think that was going to be capable to get back to those performances?

CHAD SUMMERS: Yeah, I told a lot of people I thought this was going to be the best performance of his life. Nothing went right to start his three-year-old year. We started out a little bit behind the eight ball. The Fountain of Youth came up. We ran, knowing we were short, trying to get to the Derby. Being a historian of the game, knowing that you kind of need to have at least two preps. Nobody's ever done it with one prep to the Derby.

We ran him. I thought he ran sneaky good that day, just got a little bit tired at the end. But I thought he ran okay. After that, he came out of it. I was out there, he had two dynamite breezes. He breezed out of the gate really, really good. We were excited.

We routed to the Arkansas Derby and were on a plane on the way to Turfway to saddle Tartabull and the Rushway and watch Two Out Hero in the Jeff Ruby, and I get a call from the blacksmith that there's something wrong with his foot. And to get that phone call when you're on a plane and on your way to Kentucky with nothing to do was a sickening feeling.

Got back there, we took care of it, patched it up. Todd Blossom did a great job and Victor Camacho in New York, working with that foot, getting him to where it needed to be.

It got us to the Wood. We weren't 100% for the Wood, but we felt like we just had to get the points. He'd already gotten some points in the Champagne, he had gotten some points in the Fountain of Youth, a 1-2-3 finish would have put him over the top and make the Derby.

And since I started buying horses from Mr. Gold six years ago, that's been the plan, to get to these Triple Crown races, to get to the Kentucky Derby. We got there with Cyberknife. Every year, we've come close a couple other times, favored in the Louisiana Derby, Second Choice is in the Wood. One reason or another, we didn't make it.

We tried to make it to the Derby. I thought he was brave in defeat. I thought he did the hard work. Obviously from post one, our work was cut out against us. Talking to Jim, he's a really nice horse. Put the pressure on us. We put them away. We put Iron Honor away and just got a little bit short maybe from that time he missed from the foot.

And we just said, all right, well, we got to decide how we want to get to the Haskell. Do you want to shorten him up and go to the Pat Day Mile, do you want to wait for the Derby, or do you want to stretch out to the Preakness and then cut back to the Haskell?

And after talking about it back and forth about, I don't know, 300, 400, thousand phone calls, we decided this was the route we were going to take. To do that, we felt like we had to push the button a little bit in the morning time to make up for some of the races that he missed out on, the finishing that he missed out on.

And so you saw some of those Bob Baffert-like workouts, I guess, couple six-furlong works. Emily Ellingwood gets on him every morning over there in New York, does a great job with him. She's been on board for every one of his breezes. Paco just looks good here at the end.

But Emily did all the dirty work. Saw some pictures of her on Thursday kind of with the horse. He can be a little bit rambunctious. But a lot of credit to her and Guillermo, his groom. Sandino was his groom down in Florida. The whole team, the whole operation, we wouldn't be here without each and every one of them, the hot walkers, everybody.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: We will open up the floor here for questions. Please speak loudly and let me know who the question is directed for.

Q. For Al. Al, you were in second place for almost two-thirds of the race. What (off microphone)?

AL GOLD: When Paco turned around for the ninth time in the race -- can you hear me? When Paco turned around for the ninth time in the race and he went straight and kept his head straight after, then I thought we had the race won.

Q. (Off microphone.)

AL GOLD: I can't hear the question. You answer it.

CHAD SUMMERS: We're over here. Look, I was at Pimlico during the COVID Preakness with Swiss Skydiver, and we ran in the Black-Eyed Susan, and it was strange. 5,000 seems like a lot compared to what that COVID Preakness was.

Being the only one at Laurel, we can say that we won the only one at Laurel. No one will ever take that record from us. We won the last-ever Grade 1 at Aqueduct. It's a shame and a tragedy that racetracks like Aqueduct and Laurel are no longer going to be around because they're foundation racetracks. They had the Preakness here for so many years. Big races here for so many years, obviously Preakness at Pimlico.

That's the thing about it. It's great, and we're going to love this and remember this for the rest of our lives. But the fact that Aqueduct and Laurel is going to shut down and only be a training center is a travesty. I would just hope that we get the opportunity as an industry to rally and save some of these tracks. We can't allow this to keep happening. There's only going to be three or four tracks left at the end of the day.

I thought Laurel put on a great show this week. I thought it was a great crowd, the ones that were here. I wish we could have a little bit more. But it's a shame that Laurel is going to close because it's a wonderful facility. It's great to train at, and they have plenty of places to celebrate, which we'll find out in a little bit. Get outside, Junior.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: They look distracted. They do have the horse here in the nightcap. Give them one second to watch this, please.

CHAD SUMMERS: He's just such a chicken on the inside. Go ahead. He's a grass horse. Anybody else?

Q. What do you think about moving the Preakness (off microphone) to try to help get more...

AL GOLD: It's a great idea. Tradition is dead. Nobody wants to run in two weeks. More horses is the best thing. That's it.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: I do have a question for upstairs really quick. During the course of these 300 to 400 phone calls, when did you really jump on board with this plan to come to Preakness?

CHAD SUMMERS: The first one. He didn't know it, but the first one.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: The next question, I asked Al about Paco looking around. What was your impression when you saw Paco looking over his shoulder?

CHAD SUMMERS: I watched Paco for a long time. That's Paco being Paco. He rides every horse with so much confidence, whether it's a match race at Parx or a Grade 1 in the Preakness. One thing we talked about yesterday, talked about today, just ride this horse with confidence. He's a better horse than what you rode in the Wood, I promise you that. He had enough horse underneath him to get the job done.

Q. (Off microphone.)

CHAD SUMMERS: Yeah, our plan is the Haskell. No bones about it. Mr. Gold being a New Jersey native, it's a race that he cherishes. He wants the opportunity to curse on TV again. So we'll point to the Haskell. How we get there, we'll talk about. We'll see how he comes out of the race. But our first immediate goal is the Haskell.

Q. (Off microphone.)

CHAD SUMMERS: We knew he was going to be really short in the Fountain of Youth when we looked at it. From the time he came back from Dale's Farm in Kentucky, and she did a great job because there weren't going to be a lot of people I trusted to take care of a horse like him when he was on the farm.

And when he came in, he was just a little bit behind the eight ball, and we didn't want to rush into anything. The one thing we didn't want to do, I felt like we made that mistake last year, chasing the Derby with another horse, and we fought it every ever since for the last year and a half.

We didn't want to gut our horse just to try to make the Kentucky Derby. We wanted to come into it the right way. We only had six works into the first race. Kendrick came down. He had worked him one time. He felt like he was the same horse, maybe a little bit better than he had been on as a two-year-old in the Champagne. And we ran okay in the first race, but obviously it's a tougher race.

And we're not the only ones with the plans or the ambitions to win the Kentucky Derby or win the Preakness. We went forward trying to the Wood, knowing that he had a race over that track and was back home.

And you saw him when he got home that his color started changing a little bit. His topline started filling out a little bit more. He just likes it at home. And I thought that's when kind of the change first started, but we were up against it with the way that his foot was.

So we were training him, but we weren't able to kind of push the button or put the pedal to the metal because we got to make sure you have a thing. They told me from the first time I came on the racetrack, no foot, no horse. Dr. Copelan said that for a long time at Overbrook Farms.

So we wanted to take care of the foot first. We felt like we were in an okay position going to the Wood, but we were a little bit short. And that's how we ran.

But I thought from that moving forward, you see the workouts that he did. You can ask the clockers in New York. You can ask Mike Welsch, the clocker at the (indiscernible), before the Champagne. When he's right, he shows it in the morning time. He's just done a really, really good job with that, and a lot of that credit goes to my assistant, Alfonso Camacho, in New York and obviously Emily Ellingwood and the job she's done getting on him every day.

Q. (Off microphone) how rewarding is it to see...

CHAD SUMMERS: It's still in a little bit of disbelief. I want to talk to Junior about what happened in the 14th, but I think, to me, it's just the credit to the staff, to the whole team that we have to get here in a place where a lot of people doubted us and probably will still continue to doubt us because that's what social media is all about.

But for me, I just feel like I'm proud of the horse. I felt like the horse deserved it. I feel like I let the horse down with his two fifth-place finishes in first two starts. I felt like I let Gold Square down trying to get to the Derby. So it's just an omen to get back here, and then this is the icing on the cake to get the victory for sure.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Before the next question, allow me to repeat it so in the press box can hear.

Q. (Off microphone.)

CHAD SUMMERS: Probably 11th.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: That question is for Chad about where he expects Napoleon Solo to be in the poles.

CHAD SUMMERS: Are you going to move him up, Bob? Okay. We got a couple of points. Listen, I have always been a little partial, right? But obviously there's been some good three-year-old performances, both sprinting and at distances.

I'm excited to see how the rest of the year plays out. I think it's a wide-open race for champion three. I'll take nothing away from the great race Golden Tempo ran in the Derby. We wish we were here in the Preakness. We were rooting for them when they were thinking about it. Unfortunately they didn't make it here. That's fine. Hopefully we can see him down the road somewhere.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: The question, Al, is for you. Why has Chad been such a good fit for you?

AL GOLD: For some reason I heard that, I don't know why. I went through 38 trainers, and I beat him up like I beat up a lot of the other ones, but at the end of the day, we're very close, and I talk to him six, seven times a day.

We got a lot of horses together, and I'm more than grateful for the job he did. Tremendous job in getting all these horses ready, especially this one.

CHAD SUMMERS: You got that on tape? I want to save that.

AL GOLD: Here's the man. (Applause.)

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Winning rider, Paco Lopez. A little late to the party as he had a mount in the nightcap here at Laurel Park. Paco, we have spoke to Chad and Al both about what they saw unfold here in Preakness 151, but take us through your trip, especially that opening quarter. Could you tell that both you and Taj Mahal were going pretty quick on the front end?

PACO LOPEZ: Pretty sure I feel very comfortable with the horse. The horsey was very confident. His confidence was very good in the gate. And Chad saw (indiscernible) he did very, very well, that horse. I took a perfect position, and then I went way, way, looking. He ran a big run, that horse, today.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: We were asking both Chad and Al. You're looking over your shoulder for a bit. Were you trying to figure out if anyone was getting that close to you?

PACO LOPEZ: Oh, for sure. Big horses come in the race. I didn't want to move too quickly. I came and looked. When it was time to move, I did it and he moved perfect, that horse, today.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Any questions downstairs for Paco? Any questions from the press box? Any further questions for this group?

Q. Paco, when you got up on Taj Mahal, did you feel your horse was going to kick it into another gear?

PACO LOPEZ: I don't know, but I know he was confident. I know the last time when I rode, he was a little tired. A little bit. Today seemed like the track (indiscernible) beat that horse today.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Another question upstairs here about Napoleon Solo in the stretch run. Did you feel like he was getting tired late at all?

PACO LOPEZ: It's hard to say, you know? I feel confident he was a confident horse today.

Q. The year that you had (off microphone) after everything that's gone on in the last year (off microphone)?

PACO LOPEZ: Any big race is big. For me, a win is a win, especially a great one like that, a good horse like that. It's special to win a race like that.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Any more questions from upstairs? One more question down here.

Q. Chad, the same question I asked earlier. From a trainer's point of view, you get the Kentucky Derby winner, do you want that extra week?

CHAD SUMMERS: I skipped the Breeder's Cup after the Champagne, right? Look, as a historian of the game, I respect what the horses before us did. There's only been so many of them to get it done, and nobody has done it since Justify.

But we breed horses differently now. We sell horses differently now. It's a different game and a different industry, unfortunately. We just have to adapt with the times. There's a lot of things that we have to adapt with the times that we have done a bad job of. The Triple Crown is just one of them. I think Mike Repole has a list if you're curious.

ASHLEY MAILLOUX: Any more questions downstairs? Press box is done upstairs. All right, a big ride here for the connections of Napoleon Solo, Preakness 151 winner, the Preakness here at Laurel Park. The day started on a high with I Love Giraffes, and ended up even better. Congrats, guys.

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