Charlton Baker, winning trainer of Gold for the King (No. 1): “He’s always been a good horse. Last race, he had a lot of excuses. He looked good coming into the race, so I thought he’d run back to his old ways. He did it pretty comfortably. It was pretty much what we wanted to see. It was good to see him come back to his form.

“They weren’t going that fast, and it was inside, so you didn’t want to get trapped in there. I think Joel [Rosario] did the right thing trying to move up, because you don’t want to get trapped. Being in the 1-hole, it wasn’t the greatest post, but he did a great job.

“It’ll be few and far in between races for him for awhile. It might be January before he makes his next start.”

On being 3-for-3 on Aqueduct’s main track: “He likes it here, so we’ll keep shipping him over until he shows he doesn’t like it.”

Joel Rosario, winning jockey aboard Gold for the King (No. 1): “It was great. He broke OK. Then he stumbled a little bit. I had to tap him. But, there was not a lot of speed. On the backside, he wanted to get up there. It looked like they weren’t going very fast, so I just let him be up there. He just pinned his ears and was looking around.

“I was just trying to keep my spot, hold my position. He caught up with the horses very quick and I was there so I just kind of kept my position there. He is a big horse. He grabbed the bridle and took off [in the stretch].

“I was on the inside of the horse on the lead [Loki’s Vengeance, No. 7]. I already got his spot, so I just had to be there and keep improving my position.”

Winning margin: 7 1/2 lengths
Final time (seven furlongs): 1:26.12
Fractions: :23.80; :47.75; 1:12.85