by James Beviglia

Wilkes-Barre, PA — After winning an elimination for the James M. Lynch memorial stakes last week aboard Yellow Diamond in 1:51, driver Jim Morrill Jr. claimed he though the horse could go the mile in the vicinity of 1:49 if he really let her go.

Morrill turned out to be prophetic when Yellow Diamond rolled to a win in the Lynch final at Mohegan Sun at Pocono Downs in 1:49.4 on Saturday afternoon, capturing the winner’s share of the $250,340 purse. The race, contested by 3-year-old fillies, is Pocono’s richest distaff race each year.

Leaving from post position 4 in a field of 8 as part of a three-horse entry that was favored at 1-9, Yellow Diamond made her move around the first turn and cleared early pacesetter Ginger And Fred shortly past the quarter-mile mark. From that point, Ginger and Fred was the only one within striking distance of Yellow Diamond, pulling to within a length at the 3/4-mile marker. But Yellow Diamond, sired by Western Terror, stayed strong to the wire and won by 1-1/4 lengths. Ginger And Fred settled for second while Shanghai Lil took the show. Fractional times for the mile were 27:2, 55.2, 1:22, and 1:49.4, which is just a fifth of a second off the Pocono track record for 3-year-old pacing fillies set by Southwind Tempo in the Lynch in 2007.

After the race, Morrill was ecstatic about his horse’s performance. “She’s just an awesome filly,” he said. “I put a lot of pressure on her this week, and she didn’t let me down.”

Yellow Diamond is trained by Tracy Brainard for owner Bulletproof Enterprises of Boca Raton, FL. Unraced as a 2-year-old, the filly won for the fourth time in six starts in ’09 and pushed her career earnings over $184,000 with the win. Morrill, the leading driver so far in 2009 at Pocono, said that the filly is expected to return to her home base in Canada for more stakes action following her win in the Lynch.