Departing was to be scratched from the Risen Star Stakes and be redirected to Sam Houston Park, where he’ll start next weekend in the $50,000 Texas Heritage Stakes.
Jeremy Plonk's selections for the Fountain of Youth, Risen Star, and Mine That Bird Derby, plus recaps and analysis of all the action on the road to the Kentucky Derby.
When the Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream Park and the Risen Star Stakes at the Fair Grounds are run on Saturday, people who follow thoroughbred racing will watch intently, even if they don’t have a financial stake in the outcome.
This year’s edition of the Grade 2 Risen Star on Saturday at Fair Grounds has attracted an overflow field of 15, headed by Normandy Invasion, Oxbow, Palace Malice, and Code West.
Football season is in the rearview mirror and March Madness is about to dominate the sports books soon, so this is the perfect time to clean out this reporter’s notebook.
Demonic, the winner of a seven-furlong maiden race for 3-year-olds in his debut on Jan. 13, had a workout delayed this week because of a “minor issue,” trainer John Sadler said.
Trainer Jeff Greenhill said this week that his stable star, Mac the Man, most likely will skip the final prep for Turfway Park’s showcase event and that the colt will just train into that race, the $550,000 Spiral Stakes on March 23.
Trainer Todd Pletcher has entered only one of his leading Derby prospects, Violence, in Saturday’s $400,000 Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream Park. And in this case, one figures to be enough.
I’m taking a shot in the Fountain of Youth with Orb, who made his debut in the same race as Violence.
Always in a Tiz, who finished fifth as the second choice in the Grade 3, $300,000 Southwest at Oaklawn this past Monday, was found to have a lung infection following the race.
