Optimizer (inside) and Two Months Rent (outside) will face off yet again in the Dixie (Alexander Barkoff/Hodges Photography)

Hall of Fame trainers Shug McGaughey and D. Wayne Lukas will have four of the nine starters in Saturday's Preakness at Pimlico, but they will also be active an hour beforehand when they saddle a total of three older horses in the Grade 2, $300,000 Dixie. The 1 1/8-mile grass test, the traditional feature preceding the middle jewel of the Triple Crown, is the richest and most prestigious of the seven Preakness undercard stakes.

Despite being a non-stakes winner, the McGaughey-trained Imagining figures to be among the leading Dixie choices. The five-year-old, who did not debut until July of his three-year-old year, has finished first or second in nine career outings, including an impressive 3 1/2-length romp against third-level allowance foes at Keeneland April 13. The Giant's Causeway horse has some stakes experience having finished a close second in the 2011 Hollywood Derby, but he was sidelined for more than eight months after finishing a dull fifth as the favorite in the Nijinsky at Woodbine last July.

Lukas will be represented by Optimizer, who wheels back on two weeks' rest after winning the race for second behind Horse of the Year Wise Dan in the Woodford Reserve Turf Classic at Churchill Downs. The English Channel colt, who was unplaced in all three classics last season, has won three Grade 3 events on grass, two of which came on soft ground.

Samitar is seeking her first win since taking the Garden City in September (NYRA/Adam Coglianese Photography)

Samitar, a classic winner in Ireland prior to her importation last summer, is the likely favorite in the Grade 3, $150,000 Gallorette Handicap over 1 1/16 miles on the turf. The Chad Brown filly captured the Garden City at Belmont in her second U.S. appearance, but is attempting to reverse a three-race losing skid in the Gallorette. Samitar dropped her first two starts of the year to the star filly Centre Court, finishing second in the Honey Fox at Gulfstream and third in the Jenny Wiley at Keeneland.

Also exiting the Jenny Wiley is Old Tune, the star Brazilian mare who captured the Endeavour and Hillsborough in her first two starts on the continent. The Pletcher-trained five-year-old showed speed in both of those tilts at Tampa Bay Downs, but that kind of early foot was completely absent at Keeneland where she stayed near the back of the field throughout.

Others of note are Grade 3 vixens Hard Not to Like and Silver Screamer; Embarr, who is a perfect three-for-three over the Pimlico turf; and the Endeavour runner-up Appealing Cat, who enters off a solid turf allowance win at Keeneland.

The only other grass stakes on the Preakness card is the $100,000 James W. Murphy, a one-mile test for three-year-olds that for many years was run as the Woodlawn.