LEXINGTON, Ky. – Forever After All put an exclamation point on a career-best Keeneland meet for trainer Brendan Walsh as she dominated Friday’s Grade 3, $350,000 Bewitch Stakes by nine lengths on the closing-day card. The victory helped Walsh earn a share of the Keeneland spring meet trainer’s title – his first such title – with Brad Cox, each with 10 wins. Walsh had a one-win lead heading into Friday’s last race, but Tickled Quist won the nightcap for Cox, who also shared the 2018 spring meet title with Wesley Ward. “Who would have thought?” Walsh said of winning the title. “It’s been a great meet, it’s just been fantastic. It’s great to have horses of that caliber to be competitive in a meet like thisespecially at one of our home tracks. It’s a tribute to my owners for supplying us with the horses and mainly my staff who work hard day in and day out. I owe it all to them really.” :: Access the most trusted data and information in horse racing! DRF Past Performances and Picks are available now. Of Walsh’s 10 wins, three came in stakes. In addition to the Bewitch, Walsh won the Grade 3 Lexington with Gosger and the Grade 3 Doubledogdare with Gin Gin. East Avenue was narrowly defeated while running second in the Grade 1 Blue Grass. The Bewitch may be a career highlight for Forever After All, who ran the race while recently confirmed in foal to Flightline, the 2023 Horse of the Year. Walsh said Forever After All scanned in foal about 24 days ago and she still may have a few more races left before she is retired. Forever After All won the Grade 3 La Prevoyante in January. “Maybe we’ll take a shot at one of the big ones before she has to retire,” said Walsh, who trains Forever After All for William Shively’s Dixiana Farms. The win was accomplished over a Keeneland turf course made yielding by heavy rains that fell in the morning and sporadically throughout the card. Course condition led to some concern forWalsh who noted that Forever After All didn’t seem to handle a ground with give in it at Woodbine in the Grade 2 Canadian last August. Since Forever After All only has a few races left, Walsh said “scratching wasn’t an option.” Irad Ortiz Jr. riding Forever After All for the first time, said Forever After All relished the soft going. Equally as important, Ortiz said, Forever After All benefitted from a bigger course with wider turns compared to those at Gulfstream Park where she ran three times this winter. In the Bewitch, Ortiz got Forever After All settled in just behind the leaders and when he pulled her into the clear around the turn, she picked up the pace and ran away and hid from the competition. “She made the turns better here than over there and she was improving,” Ortiz said. “Plus, she was a lot closer than the last few times so that helped big time. By the three-eighths pole, I’m loaded, she’s waiting for me. When I asked her, it was over.” Youknownothing, who was last for the first mile of the race, rallied to get second, 6 1/4 lengths clear of Immensitude. Dazzlin’ Dictator was fourth followed by Eternal Silence, Sabalenka, and Sand and Sea. Strikingly Spun and Just Basking scratched. Forever After All, a 6-year-old daughter of Connect, covered the 1 1/2 miles in 2:35.56 over the yielding course and returned $5.62 as the favorite. Prat takes riding title In the race immediately following the Bewitch, Flavien Prat, the reigning Eclipse Award winning jockey, guided Unmatched Wisdom to victory in an allowance race to clinch his first Keeneland riding title. It was the 20th win of the meet for Prat, who finished two wins in front of Luis Saez and Jose Ortiz, both with 18. Brad Kelley’s Calumet Farm was leading owner at the meet with five wins. Godolphin and Hat Creek Racing finished in a tie for second with three apiece. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.