ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Kevin Attard won last year’s Woodstock Stakes with the future King’s Plate winner and Canadian champion Mansetti. The 2024 Sovereign Award-winning trainer has Two Out Hero in this year’s Woodstock on Sunday, when the son of War Front cuts back to six furlongs in the $125,000 event for 3-year-olds.

Churchill Downs
Thursday, April 23
Weather: Clear
Temperature: 66°
Track: Fast

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The inexact science of preparing a horse for a grueling race like the Kentucky Derby was never more on display than Thursday at Churchill Downs, with trainers using very diverse methods of bringing their 3-year-olds up to the big event. Even within their own barns.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Silent Tactic finished four lengths behind Renegade in the Arkansas Derby four weeks ago, but it felt like the gap between the two 3-year-olds was larger than that.

Mark Casse, the trainer of Silent Tactic, understands his horse has to run better than he did that day to compete with Renegade but he believes his horse will run better.

Casse said that he and his team were nursing Silent Tactic through a bruised foot in the four weeks between the Grade 2 Rebel – in which Silent Tactic was beaten a nose by Class President – and the Arkansas Derby.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Standoutsensation will meet a new pace rival in Runamileinmyshoes on Saturday when she seeks to win her second stakes race of the Oaklawn Park meet in the $200,000 Dig A Diamond.

The one-mile race for fillies and mares is being run as the 10th race on an 11-race card that begins at 12:45 p.m. Central. A field of seven is set to start, including the up-and-coming Pronghorn.

Standoutsensation will start from the rail under Rafael Bejarano and Runamileinmyshoes will be on the opposite end of the gate in post 7 under Ramon Vazquez.

Perusing racing news often feels like mere doomscrolling, but peel back that tissue of trouble and the best horses, the heart of the sport, have a very strong pulse.

The Oaklawn Handicap was awesome, and Sovereignty, defeated, remains a fearsome beast. Burnham Square seemed like a serious grass horse winning the Elkhorn. Gezora makes her 2026 debut next week. This looks like the best Derby in a long time. The Oaks has heft.

Lots to look forward to, even if this Saturday’s stakes action came up light.

Royal Heroine

Florida-breds of all ages will share the spotlight Saturday at Gulfstream Park, where six $100,000 stakes restricted to statebreds highlight a stellar 11-race card. Those six stakes make up the entirety of a mandatory-payout Rainbow 6 sequence that is expected to offer a final pool of approximately $3 million if not hit on either Thursday or Friday’s programs.

Post time for the special program has been advanced to 12:05 p.m.

Ka Ying Rising has redefined sprint excellence in Hong Kong in recent years.

Ka Ying Rising, who will start as a massive favorite in Sunday’s Group 1 Chairman’s Sprint Prize at Sha Tin Racecourse, has won 19 consecutive races since February 2024, a record for a Hong Kong-based runner, and has lowered the six-furlong course record three times in the last 18 months.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – The talented maiden Lakota Lady could graduate in style in Saturday’s $125,000 Star Shoot for 3-year-old fillies, the first stakes of the Woodbine meet.

Lakota Lady worked strongly prior to debuting in a Feb. 14 maiden special weight on the dirt at Fair Grounds. Sent off at 13-1 in a deep field, she finished a clear second to Goodall, who subsequently took the Purple Martin Stakes at Oaklawn Park with a 94 Beyer Speed Figure.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – This week, the eyes of the sports world are on Louisville, as the River City prepares for the 152nd running of the Kentucky Derby on May 2.

“It’s a great, great time of year,” said trainer Brad Cox, a Louisville native. “It’s Louisville’s day to shine throughout the world.”

But there is life beyond the Kentucky Derby. This Saturday kicks off the Churchill Downs spring meet, with a total of 44 race dates and 50 stakes races cumulatively worth a record $27.8 million.

ARCADIA, Calif. – In the wake of a fatal breakdown in a hillside turf sprint April 4, followed by miscommunication that compromised heavily favored Queen Maxima in the Grade 3 Monrovia Stakes the same day, Santa Anita veterinary staff have issued new protocols for hillside turf sprints.

The Santa Anita Downhill Turf Course Protocols limit horses eligible for downhill races and require jockeys to school their mounts downhill over the dirt crossing before going to the starting gate at the top of the hill. The directive also precludes apprentice jockeys from riding in those races.