Way back when, trainer Ned Allard got the Campbell family – Marilyn and her late husband Gil, racing as Stonehedge LLC – started in the Thoroughbred business. It’s a partnership that’s still going strong.

“I bought them their first horse 42 years ago, and I’ve been training for them ever since,” Allard said recently.

On Sunday he’ll bring Stonehedge’s all-time leading winner by dollar amount to Laurel Park for the $150,000 Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash. That’s Dean Delivers, and the earner of more than $637,000 arrives on a two-race win streak.

The De Francis, once one of America’s premier sprint stakes, helped make several champions over the years. None of the 10 entered Sunday figures to be in that conversation, but it’s a salty field all the same.

In addition to Dean Delivers, a Grade 3 winner, the field includes Sibelius, who won the Group 1 Dubai Golden Shaheen in 2023, and another Grade 3 winner in Little Vic. Stakes winners Gordian Knot, Alwaysinahurry, Seven’s Eleven, Prince of Jericho, and Twisted Ride also add intrigue.

But none will enter the race any hotter than Dean Delivers, whose two recent wins, in the Mr. Prospector at Monmouth and in the Alapocas Run at Delaware Park, have both come by open lengths. He’s earned mid-90s Beyer speed figures for each.

The Mr. Prospector, which took place May 27, was the first race for Dean Delivers, a five-year-old Cajun Breeze gelding, under Allard’s care.

“I thought he’d run well the first time, but that far outdid my expectations. I felt he’d be tough in the race, but when he drew off and won like that … he wowed me,” Allard said.

It was also his first start in more than two months after a five-race losing streak – Including defeats at 6-5 and 3-5 – prompted the horse’s owners to move him from trainer Michael “Bo” Yates.

“This horse tailed off a little in Florida,” Allard said. “It was getting really hot, and they thought that moving him up here was going to help, and I think it certainly has.”

Allard points out that Yates did a “wonderful job” with Dean Delivers, winning two stakes and registering the bulk of his earnings to date. But he said that the irrepressible heat can take its toll on a horse over time.

Even when he raced July 8 in the Alapocas Run – over a weekend that was so hot that Delaware shifted its Saturday card to Monday for even slight relief – Allard said the Florida heat was something different entirely.

“This is hot, but try going to Ocala or Gulfstream this time of the year,” he said. “This might feel like a cool day.”

In the Alapocas Run, Dean Delivers pressed the pace set by three-time Grade 3 winner Super Chow, the 8-5 favorite. He drew even in upper stretch and gradually wore that rival down, ultimately winning by 2 ½ lengths while Super Chow faded to fourth.

“We kind of thought our post position was going to allow us to do whatever we needed to do,” Allard said afterwards. “If there was no speed, he might have gone right to the lead, but that other horse, he was able to sit off of.”

Jaime Rodriguez had the mount in the Alapocas Run and has the return mount Sunday.

“One thing about it, you don’t have to tell Jaime how to ride one,” Allard said with a laugh. “He gets to the winner’s circle a lot more than I do. He’s a good rider, and a good guy.”

Since the Alapocas Run, Dean Delivers has recorded one breeze at Delaware Park. On July 19 he went an easy half-mile in 51 2/5 seconds.

“He’s been training really well [and] he looks great,” he added. “His last two performances were superb, so I’m hoping that he can continue on.”

His two nearest competitors from the Alapocas Run also are slated to run in the De Francis. Prince of Jericho rallied into second that day, while Gordian Knot held third. Neither posed much of a threat to the winner, though.

The most intriguing of Dean Delivers’ rivals, though, is likely Sibelius. A three-time graded or Group stakes winner, the Jerry O’Dwyer trainee has earned just over $1.8 million in a career that saw him make his first career start at Laurel and win his first-ever stake at Pimlico. That came in the 2022 Lite the Fuse.

Since then he’s won Gulfstream’s Grade 3 Mr. Prospector twice, as well as the Golden Shaheen.

He was unable to defend his Golden Shaheen crown this past March, though, fading in the final furlong. In his first start since, he led to the final furlong before settling for third in the Smile Sprint at Gulfstream.

 “We were very proud of him, very pleased,” O’Dwyer said. “We’re running him back here in three weeks because he came out of the race so well. He had a nice maintenance breeze the other day at Gulfstream, just to make sure he was moving good and feeling good and himself. He’s giving us all the right signs.”

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