Over the subsequent 30 years of Breeders’ Cup drama any number of owners and trainers have been blessed with talented horses who did not quite fit, even with the increase of races. The most glaring catch basin for “tweeners” has become the $1 million Dirt Mile, which will be run for the ninth time on Friday, Oct. 30.
Daily Racing Form will be one of the sponsors of a new program at the University of Arizona Symposium on Racing and Gaming that is designed to encourage new ideas for horse racing, the company announced on Wednesday.
Ocean Knight kicked off his 3-year-old season this year with a graded stakes victory, and his connections hope there’s another one with his name on it before 2015 comes to a close. Friday, Ocean Knight will try to earn his way to next month’s Grade 3 Discovery at Aqueduct when heads an eight-horse field in an $80,000 second-level allowance race at Belmont Park.
The stakes winners Jakaby Jade and Stays In Vegas are part of a projected field of 11 in Saturday’s $100,000 Surfer Girl Stakes for 2-year-old fillies at a mile on turf at Santa Anita.
If not for running against the great Lady Eli in a $1 million race, Sentiero Italia would be undefeated since the spring. That terrific 4-for-5 streak should be enough to make the Godolphin homebred a solid favorite to knock out her first Grade 1 when she goes postward Saturday in the $500,000 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland.
The speedy Liam’s Map will be pointed to the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile on Oct. 30 at Keeneland and bypass the Breeders’ Cup Classic on Oct. 31, trainer Todd Pletcher said on Wednesday from Keeneland.
Imperative worked a half-mile in 47 seconds at Santa Anita on Wednesday and may start in the $200,000 Fayette Stakes at 1 1/8 miles on dirt at Keeneland on Oct. 30, the first day of the Breeders’ Cup races.
Shared Belief, the champion 2-year-old male of 2013, will resume training at Golden Gate Fields in early November, moving closer to an expected comeback in early 2016.
Trainer Dale Romans and the Albaugh Family Stable already have one of the favorites for the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile in Brody’s Cause, who was a good-looking winner of last Saturday’s Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland. But Romans and the Albaughs have another 2-year-old they like just as much – if not more – in Unbridled Outlaw, and are hopeful he too can get into the Juvenile field.
Minding, who will be favored in Friday’s $760,000 Fillies’ Mile at Newmarket Racecourse in England, has kept pretty good company in recent starts.
