Saturday, Blingismything tries to win the most prestigious and lucrative race of her career in the $250,000 John Mabee Stakes for fillies and mares going 1 1/8 miles on turf at Del Mar. Once again, Fanticola is a rival that trainer Eric Kruljac fears.
It may have taken an insanely long time for trainer King Leatherbury, 82, to get onto the ballot, but it only took one try to get into the National Racing Museum and Hall of Fame, which he officially enters on Friday.
If a trend that started a few years ago continues, there will be a young, lively, and late-arriving crowd at Hastings for the first of four straight Friday evening cards. The feature race is a $25,000 claiming race that drew eight horses, and it will be interesting to see how a 4-year-old on the rise, Richter Red, holds up against accomplished competiton.
Thursday's Saratoga card is 10 races deep, highlighted by a pair of stakes at either end of the card, the A. P. Smithwick Memorial, a Grade 1 hurdle, and the Quick Call, a 5 1/2-furlong listed stakes on the grass for 3-year-olds. I'll be playing both of those races and a few of the offerings in between.
Melmich has taken his game to another level this year, and the exciting 4-year-old is a worthy favorite in Friday’s Woodbine headliner, a second-level, optional-claiming route on the Polytrack. Melmich was claimed for a bargain $20,000 last September by trainer Kevin Attard. He proceeded to win two of his next three outings against $40,000 conditional claimers.
Some look at the field for Saturday’s Grade 1, $1.25 million Whitney Stakes and see seven Grade 1 stakes winners among its 10 entrants. Hall of Fame trainer Shug McGaughey looks at the field for the 88th Whitney Stakes and thinks, “There are some question marks.”
Michael Dickinson’s decision to resume training after a seven-year absence should not be taken lightly. Dickinson’s goal is for Act 2 of his career to be more successful than his first.
Wiggle It Jiggleit, the No. 1-rated horse in harness racing’s weekly rankings, will race for the first time since winning the Meadowlands Pace on July 18 when he faces eight rivals in Saturday’s $319,400 Cane Pace for 3-year-old pacers at Meadowlands Racetrack.
Handle on U.S. races in July was up 1.4 percent compared with betting during the same month last year, but the number of races run was up 2.2 percent, despite a sustained falloff in the past year in the number of races and race days held by U.S. tracks, according to figures released Wednesday by Equibase.
With six wins during the third week of the meet, including a record-setting five in one day, Doug O’Neill has surged to the top of the trainer standings at Del Mar, and he’ll hope his hot streak continues Friday, when Birdlover turns back in distance for the shortest race of her career in the $80,000 Daisycutter Handicap for older female turf sprinters.
