For the third year in a row, Breeders’ Cup will award credits toward the entry fees of six of its dirt races to runners in designated stakes races that are scheduled for the lead-up to the two-day event on Nov. 1-2.
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The Beyer Speed Figure for the Grade 2 Risen Star Stakes run Feb. 17 at Fair Grounds has been upgraded by five points. Originally given a 90 for winning that race, Sierra Leone now has a 95. All other horses in the field also received a five-point upgrade.
The winning streak began rather anonymously during the lunch hour at Santa Anita on Saturday with a win aboard the well-regarded colt Ball Don’t Like in a maiden race for sprinters.
By mid-afternoon, the world-famous jockey Frankie Dettori had won six consecutive races, including two stakes, sweeping the second through seventh races.
Dettori was on the verge of equaling, and perhaps surpassing, the track’s all-time record of seven wins in a day set by Laffit Pincay Jr. in March 1987.
It was not to be.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Grade 1-winning millionaires Adare Manor and Wet Paint lead a field of nine fillies and mares for the Grade 1, $1.25 million Apple Blossom Handicap on Saturday at Oaklawn Park.
Entries for the 1 1/16-mile race were taken Sunday.
The Apple Blossom will share a card with the Grade 3, $500,000 Count Fleet Sprint Handicap, led by 125-pound highweight Skelly. First post for the 12-race card will be noon Central.
Trainer Brett Brinkman is continuing to savor the first Grade 1 victory of his career with Alva Starr, whom he also co-bred with P. Dale Ladner, while looking ahead to other Grade 1 races this season with the filly.
“The training aspect of it hasn’t quite hit home, I don’t think," Brinkman said of Alva Starr, who won Saturday’s Grade 1 Madison Stakes at Keeneland by a half-length over Vahva. “The breeding aspect of it really means a lot to me.”
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - After shipping cross-country to win the Grade 3 Gazelle Stakes at Aqueduct on Saturday, Where’s My Ring will make a bit shorter journey to Louisville for the Kentucky Oaks on May 3, trainer Val Brinkerhoff said Sunday.
Brinkerhoff said Where’s My Ring will stay in New York for about a week before shipping to Louisville for the Kentucky Oaks.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Trainer Bill Mott knew he’d be running in something on Kentucky Derby day at Churchill Downs. Unsure about the Derby itself, Mott had his wife Tina make plane reservations to return home to upstate New York Saturday night. Takeoff is 6:05 p.m.
“I said if we’re not in the Derby, we’ll run these other horses, go to the airport and watch it on the plane,” Mott said. “I guess now we’ll stick around a bit.”
LEXINGTON, Ky. - A relaxed and affable Chad Brown worked several sets of horses Sunday morning at Keeneland, and why wouldn’t Brown be walking on air? Brown had runners Saturday at four racecourses, and from 14 races his stable ended the day with eight winners. Not a bad haul. At Aqueduct, Brown won the Bay Shore with Reasoned Analysis and the Distaff with Shidabhuti, and capped the day here in the Blue Grass Stakes with the most important horse in Brown’s stable right now, Sierra Leone.
Fierceness, the runaway winner of the March 30 Florida Derby, emerged as the strong favorite in the final Kentucky Derby Future Wager pool, settling at 5-2.
The final future wager closed on Saturday afternoon prior to the running of three major preps for the Kentucky Derby, so the prices of the pool do not reflect the performances of the horses in those races, including Sierra Leone’s victory from well off the pace in the Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland.
Leslie’s Rose, winner of the Grade 1 Ashland Stakes on Friday at Keeneland, “came back well” from her victory as trainer Todd Pletcher begins plotting her preparations for the Kentucky Oaks.
Leslie’s Rose, who earned a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 95 for her three-length win, her third victory in four lifetime starts, will remain at Keeneland for at least the coming days, as Pletcher finalizes his Kentucky Derby and Kentucky Oaks squadron in the remaining points races, and makes workout and shipping plans for all of them.