Refreshed after his Kentucky Derby-Preakness-Belmont Stakes run in May and June, three-year-old colt American Pharoah is fit and ready to return to action.

Just how good was American Pharoah’s Belmont Stakes?

More than 60,000 people, 10 times the population, are expected to come flooding into the area over the weekend to see the most famous three-year-old in the world.

With the purse for race being increased to $1.75 million, making the Haskell the richest non-Breeders’ Cup horse race ever run in New Jersey, track officials are bracing for a historic race for the Oceanport facility.

American Pharoah is scheduled to school in the paddock at Monmouth Park on Friday around 12:30 p.m. with the horses for the first race.

Baffert is quite comfortable at Monmouth Park, having won the Haskell a record seven times, including last year with Bayern. He had a police escort from Atlantic City, and spent the night in trainer Kelly Breen’s barn. However, in all fairness to Secretariat, while he was retired at the end of 1973, he did run six more times after the Belmont, including in the Arlington Invitational Stakes the same month he won the Triple Crown.

Authorities have charged a northern New Jersey man with murder in the stabbing death of a friend late past year.

“Were taking a shot, ” Catalano said.

To keep it simple, every horse will be chasing after Bob Baffert’s American Pharoah on Sunday.

But like us, you’re probably wondering what it feels like to move so fast.

Barnes said that if American Pharoah had not shipped across the country, Thursday still would have been a normal jog day for him following his Tuesday workout at Del March.

With nothing short of a smashing impact on business expected on Haskell Day, Kulina is also looking at the broader picture – what American Pharoah’s presence at Monmouth Park will mean down the road for the track, whose very existence was in jeopardy just several years ago. Hopefully we get some racing luck, and Pharoah will show up. American Pharoah is the heavy favorite for the 1 1/8-mile race.

Barnes said he and the horse slept well Wednesday night after an 11 1/2-hour flight from Ontario, California, that included a 20-minute refueling stop in Lexington, Kentucky.

“[Pharoah has] been training very well”, Baffert said. So each of the three possible opportunities to see him race will be embraced – starting with Sunday’s date on the Jersey Shore.