Touching Beauty won the $100,000 Comely S. at Aqueduct to put her near the top of the 3-year-old class. The bay daughter of Tapit is co-owned and bred by Gainesway Stable.

The one-mile Comely was the first graded victory for Touching Beauty, who had previously ran second in both the Matron (G2) and the Silent Turn S. In the Comely, Touching Beauty broke from the far outside in the field of eight but got into a good spot just a couple of lengths off the lead after a quarter mile. She was three wide down the backstretch and far turn, advancing steadily to get the lead near the 3/16ths pole. Despite a couple of challenges in the stretch, Touching Beauty dug in to win by a half-length, stopping the clock in 1:37.90 for the one mile.

“My trip was perfect,” said jockey Mike Luzzi, aboard the filly for the first time. “I didn’t want her to angle out so soon, but I didn’t want her to get trapped either. She just stayed there and waited for me to call on her, and when I asked her, she finished up nice.”

Touching Beauty bankrolled $60,000 for the victory, upping her lifetime total to $181,450 for Gainesway and co-owner Joseph Cornacchia. She is now 3-2-0 in seven starts. Gainesway consigned and sold Touching Beauty at the 2008 Keeneland January all ages sale, then repurchased her at the 2009 Fasig-Tipton February 2-year-old sale.

Tapit currently stands in third place on the North American third-crop sire list, with progeny earnings of just over $1 million.