Miss Double d’Oro invaded from Southern California and appreciated the class drop from a Grade 3 as she proved a smart winner of the $50,000 Wine Country Stakes at Santa Rosa on Saturday.
Lock Down Lindy and Spirit To Win emerged as the leading ladies and likely favorites for the $500,000 Hambletonian Oaks final on August 8 at The Meadowlands.
Beholder won the 11th stakes of her career in the $300,750 Clement Hirsch Stakes at Del Mar, pulling clear from seven overmatched rivals to win by seven lengths. The win stretched her winning streak to four races, and left owner B. Wayne Hughes and trainer Richard Mandella contemplating a first-ever start against males for the 5-year-old Beholder in the $1 million Pacific Classic on Aug. 22, the track’s richest race.
In a scratch-reduced field of four, Texas Red sat second, always within 1 1/2 lengths of the pacesetting Japan. But in the stretch, he displayed that same determined late run and won the Jim Dandy by a half-length over Frosted.
Red Rifle continued to show his versatility while seemingly improving with age after parlaying a picture-perfect ride by Javier Castellano into a 2 1/2-length victory over War Dancer in Saturday’s $250,000 Bowling Green at Saratoga.
R Dub won his third straight race Saturday at Arapahoe Park, where he darted to a 1 1/4-length win over Let the Boy Sing in the $35,000 colts and geldings division of the Silver Cup Futurity.
Madefromlucky bounced back from his sixth-place finish in the Belmont Stakes by rallying wide under Joe Bravo to defeat Souper Colossal by 1 1/2 lengths Saturday in the Grade 2 West Virginia Derby at Mountaineer Racetrack.
In a thrilling stretch drive in Saturday's Alfred Vanderebilt at Saratoga, it was the Todd Pletcher-trained Rock Fall nosing out the John Velazquez-ridden The Big Beast in a race where Velazquez lost his whip inside the three-sixteenths pole.
Room for Me has found new life since being claimed earlier this year and sent east, and she scored her biggest win yet Saturday when rolling to a 5 3/4-length victory in the $77,500 Regret Stakes for female sprinters at Monmouth Park.
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Falling Sky held off a surging Ledokol by a head to win the $75,000 Trinniberg on Saturday at Gulfstream Park.
