Illini Princess brightens fall Friday at Hawthorne

STICKNEY, Ill. – Hawthorne Racecourse is poised to start construction of a casino, operational as early as 2020, that will considerably boost the track’s sagging purse structure. Consider Friday a sneak preview of how things might look during that era, with an actual stakes race headlining a weekday racing program.

Featured on the nine-race card is race 6, the $50,000 Illini Princess for Illinois-bred fillies and mares at 1 1/16 miles on turf. The race drew eight entrants and Hawthorne drew lucky with the local weather forecast, which is for a couple of dry, relatively sunny days likely to leave Friday’s grass races on a course in good shape for this time of year.

Lovely Loyree, whose career bankroll sits less than $100 shy of $400,000, easily is the most accomplished horse in the Illini Princess, but her 8-year-old campaign has been limited to just three starts, and the Michele Boyce-trained mare has looked at least slightly diminished compared to her 2018 form. She does have a fine 2-2-1 record from five starts over the Hawthorne course, which not every turf horse seems to like, and Lovely Loyree worked a quick 1:00.80 on the Hawthorne dirt in her final drill for this start.

Embarrassing won the Mike Spellman Memorial Handicap in July, the most recent race in this division, but hadn’t turned in a performance that strong before the Spellman and has done nothing since to validate it. More popular than she at the betting windows will be East Coast shipper Bramble Queen, whose recent turf-route form in New York and New Jersey stacks up with anything in this race.

The pick to win, though, is Kool Kate, who was claimed for $40,000 last month by trainer Marvin Johnson, who owns the mare with Seven Arms Stable. Kool Kate finished second to Embarrassing as the odds-on favorite in the Spellman Memorial, but failed to fire her best shot that day. Just less than a year ago in her lone race over the Hawthorne course, Kool Kate ran perhaps the best race of her career, and on Friday her outside draw should allow jockey Edgar Perez to dole out her speed in an efficient fashion.

Hotshot Anna to race in 2020

Hotshot Anna has been withdrawn from a November sale in Kentucky and will stay in training for a 7-year-old campaign, owner-trainer Hugh Robertson said Wednesday.

Hotshot Anna has won the $400,000 Presque Isle Downs Masters two years in a row and has ranked as the leading older female sprinter on synthetic surfaces. She’s also gotten good on turf and won a high-level grass-sprint allowance race by a half-length Sunday at Keeneland.

Hotshot Anna fractured her withers in a freak accident last winter at Fair Grounds, but came back this past summer as strong as she’d been as a 5-year-old. Robertson said the mare is getting a brief freshening in Kentucky before shipping to join his string in New Orleans, where she’ll be aimed at the female turf-sprint program.