California Gold Rush kicks off holiday weekend stakes action

ARCADIA, Calif. - The upcoming Memorial Day weekend has seven six-figure stakes from Saturday through Monday, the busiest stretch of stakes at Santa Anita’s spring-summer meeting, which runs through July 10.

Saturday’s program has five stakes for California-breds, ranging in value from $100,000 to $200,000. Sunday’s main race is the $200,000 Charles Whittingham Stakes, a Grade 2 stakes at 1 1/4 miles on turf. Monday’s top race is the $300,000 Gamely Stakes for fillies and mares at 1 1/8 miles on turf, the first of five Grade 1 races at the meeting.

Saturday’s California Gold Rush program is the primary day of stakes for California-breds in the spring and summer.

Gold Rush Dancer, Tough It Out, and Midnight Ming - the first three finishers of the Silky Sullivan Stakes at Golden Gate Fields on May 1 - will be part of a small field in the $200,000 Snow Chief Stakes for 3-year-old Cal-breds at 1 1/8 miles on turf.

Enola Gray, the winner of a maiden race at 6 1/2 furlongs by 16 1/4 lengths in her debut on April 10, will be a heavy favorite to win the $200,000 Melair Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at 1 1/16 miles. The leading race for older horses is the $150,000 Tiznow Stakes at a mile.

There are two stakes on turf – the $125,000 Fran’s Valentine Stakes for fillies and mares at a mile, and the $100,000 Lennyfrommalibu Stakes at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course.

Boozer, who won the Bertrando Stakes at Los Alamitos on April 16, is nominated for the Tiznow and Lennyfrommalibu Stakes. Trainer Mark Glatt said on Sunday that a decision has yet to be made on which race will be selected.