Kentucky notes: Chilukki has strong top three

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The first stakes of the 25-day Churchill fall meet, which starts Sunday, figures to be a good one. It’s the Grade 2, $150,000 Chilukki, a one-turn mile for which such top fillies as Pure Fun, Sky Girl, and Wine Princess are being pointed.

The Chilukki will be run Nov. 2, the Saturday of Breeders’ Cup weekend. The fall meet normally had begun with the Pocahontas and Iroquois anchoring the first of two Stars of Tomorrow programs exclusively for 2-year-olds, but those two stakes were shifted instead to the new September meet as Win and You’re In races toward the Breeders’ Cup.

Opening day still will be a Stars of Tomorrow card, except the features will be two newly created, $60,000 races called the Street Sense and Rags to Riches. A second Stars of Tomorrow card will be held on closing day, Nov. 30, when anchored by the Kentucky Jockey Club and Golden Rod Stakes, both Grade 2 races.

On Nov. 16, the only Downs After Dark night program of the meet will be run, with twin 3-year-old turf stakes, the Grade 2 Mrs. Revere and Grade 3 Commonwealth Turf, serving as co-features. The Ken McPeek duo of Frac Daddy and War Dancer are among those likely for the Commonwealth.

First-timers at Keeneland

A handful of trainers have won their first-ever Keeneland race at this meet, the latest of which was Ben Colebrook, whose victory with Mt Tronador in the last race Saturday also was the first of his career. Colebrook, 35, is a former assistant to Christophe Clement and now has his own horses in the Rice Road stabling area.

Conversely, while the victory for Mario Pino aboard Jamraa in the fifth race Saturday was his first ever at Keeneland, the veteran jockey is hardly a stranger to the winner’s circle. Pino, now based in Delaware and Pennsylvania after spending most of his 35-year career in Maryland, entered this week with 6,561 wins, 10th all time in North America and third among active riders behind Russell Baze (12,068) and Edgar Prado (6,671).

Flores back to California

Veteran jockey David Flores, who won 15 races in less than a couple of months’ stay in Kentucky, has returned to his home in Southern California and will not be riding the final week of Keeneland nor through the Churchill meet, as originally intended. Flores is named on one mount Thursday at Santa Anita.

Flores, a winner of more than 3,500 races, notched his last of six Keeneland wins Friday with a terrific ride aboard Regally Ready in a one-mile turf allowance.