Kalamos continues trainer's remarkable saga

Another chapter will be tacked onto the remarkable story of Edward Boerjan when he saddles Kalamos for the second race Friday at Keeneland.

Kalamos, purchased here last November for a mere $3,000 at the horses-of-racing-age sale, was 50-1 when capturing the $150,000 Old Friends Stakes on Sept. 16 at Kentucky Downs, giving Boerjan easily the biggest coup of his intermittent career as an owner and trainer.

Boerjan, a 61-year-old Iowa native, is a semiretired pipe fitter battling cancer. He lives in Fort Wayne, Ind., from where he and Kalamos will be vanning south for a $65,000 turf allowance in which the 6-year-old horse will have no more than five opponents.

Lopez, Bravo will be regulars

The top New York jockeys will only make spot appearances prior to the Breeders’ Cup, but two East Coast jockeys who will ride here regularly throughout October are Paco Lopez and Joe Bravo, both with Cory Moran as their agent.

This is the third straight Keeneland meet for Lopez, the leading jockey at Monmouth Park the last three years; he went 12 for 71 here last fall and 6 for 41 last spring. Bravo, who has ridden 5,047 winners in his career and has been on a stakes tear with 19 wins this year, rode regularly at Keeneland for the first time last fall, winning once from 24 mounts.

◗ Tom Durkin, the retired race-caller for the New York Racing Association and other major racing events, was the featured, honored guest Tuesday night at the 84th annual testimonial dinner hosted by the Thoroughbred Club of America on the southwest corner of the Keeneland campus.