Hillaby seems ready to put her best hoof forward on Saturday at Woodbine in the $150,000 Seaway Stakes, a seven-furlong sprint which lured a top-notch group of fillies and mares. Hillaby was voted the Sovereign Award as Canada’s champion female sprinter in 2014, during which she won four of five starts, including the Grade 2 Bessarabian Stakes in November.
Indecise (#2, ML 8-5) returns in Thursday's seventh race at Del Mar, a one-mile optional claimer on turf. It will be her first start since finishing fourth by a head in the Grade 3 Wilshire Stakes on April 26 at Santa Anita. The third- and fifth-place finishers from that race came back to win stakes races in their next starts. Get the Key Race report as part of DRF Plus. Sign up for DRF Plus here.
Kentucky Derby winner Mine That Bird was among the inductees into the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame at the Mississauga Convention Center on Wednesday night.
Wednesday at Del Mar, Mrazek won his first stakes in the $100,000 Graduation Stakes for California-breds, leading throughout to score a convincing victory by 3 1/4 lengths. The win left Mrazek on schedule for the $150,000 I’m Smokin Stakes for Cal-breds on Sept. 4, with a possible audible on Labor Day weekend.
Unbridled Forever and Stonetastic were the class of the field assembled for Wednesday’s $100,000 Shine Again Stakes at Saratoga. The question was whether the two fillies would show any rust from having been idle since the end of their 2014 campaigns. The answer to that question turned out to be an unequivocal "no" after Unbridled Forever ran down the 2-1 favorite Stonetastic in the final strides to register a neck decision in the seven-furlong Shine Again, a race written for fillies and mares who had not won a graded stakes in 2015.
The first set of races in the Florida Sire Stakes drew a total of 66 entries, with trainer Stanley Gold accounting for eight of them in the seven stakes to be run Saturday at Gulfstream Park.
DRF handicapper Lonnie Goldfeder provides his best plays on Thursday's card at Del Mar.
Derick Giwner's analysis of the Friday 8/7 card at The Meadowlands.
Garnet Barnsdale's analysis of the Friday 8/7 card at Mohawk Racetrack.
The $500,000 Hambletonian Oaks asks its fillies to race two times to be declared the champion, but unlike the open division the fillies are entitled to rest seven days between races as opposed to one hour. That should leave ten fillies ready when the gate wings close for the 12th race on Saturday afternoon at The Meadowlands.
