OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer Carlos Martin has been on a nice run recently, winning five races with his last 10 starters at Aqueduct since Oct. 31. Three of those wins have come with horses returning from layoffs of 130 days or greater.
In Thursday’s featured second-level allowance/optional-claiming feature at Aqueduct, Martin sends out Frau Diablo, a 4-year-old filly who returns from a 166-day layoff and makes her first start for him after previously racing for Mike Maker.
Nick Alexander, one of California’s most prominent breeders, is holding a partial dispersal of 23 horses at the Fasig-Tipton Digital Sale that begins on Thursday and continues through Dec. 11, according to a statement issued on Monday.
Alexander’s draft includes 17 California-bred yearlings and six broodmares, five of whom are in foal to Grazen, the state’s leading sire by progeny earnings in 2023.
The race for leading rider at the Del Mar autumn meeting was close as late as Sunday morning, hours before the final day of the season. Then, it wasn’t.
Juan Hernandez won five races from eight mounts on Sunday’s nine-race program to finish the season with 21 wins, five more than Umberto Rispoli.
Through Saturday, Hernandez had led Rispoli, 16 wins to 14.
A day after Sacred Wish’s surprise win in Sunday’s Grade 1 Matriarch Stakes at Del Mar, trainer George Weaver’s thoughts had already turned toward a potential return to the San Diego area track in 12 months.
Sacred Wish won her first graded stakes in her 11th try in the $303,000 Matriarch Stakes. Graded stakes will be a fixture of Sacred Wish’s 5-year-old season in 2025, possibly starting in the Grade 2 Pegasus World Cup Filly and Mare Turf Invitational at Gulfstream Park on Jan. 25.
The 2025 Matriarch is another such goal.
In the first week of December 2023, Yellow Feathers delivered an eye-catching performance, winning a six-furlong maiden race by 9 1/2 lengths at Tampa Bay Downs. It was her second career start, first on dirt.
As talented as she appeared, her connections felt she wasn’t quite mentally ready for a steady campaign. Instead of pressing on, trainer and part-owner Aldana Spieth and her husband, jockey Scott Spieth, opted to back off.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – After completing his juvenile campaign undefeated and virtually untested, and with a sweep of the Florida Sire Series on what is already a very imposing résumé, Rated by Merit is going to get a bit of a rest.
Trainer Michael Yates said Monday that Rated by Merit came out of his 6 1/2-length victory in Saturday’s 1 1/16-mile In Reality Stakes in good order and that he will stick to the plan mapped out prior to the race to give him a little break before setting out on the road to the Kentucky Derby later in the meet.
The long winter stand at Turfway Park begins Wednesday in Florence, Ky., and runs for roughly the next four months.
An early highlight will be the debut of the Turfway Park Synthetic Championships, with four stakes worth a combined $1 million, on Dec. 14. The meet’s 3-year-old races will build toward a major card highlighted by the Grade 3, $700,000 Jeff Ruby in March, a race that has been a meaningful prep toward the Triple Crown series in recent years.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Stakes-placed As Catch Can has found a cozy spot in Thursday’s Woodbine headliner and should be favored in the mile and 70-yard allowance for 2-year-old fillies.
Trained by Jonathan Thomas for Augustin Stable, As Catch Can graduated third time out in a one-mile maiden special on turf Aug. 16 at Colonial Downs. Two months later, the daughter of Mo Town stumbled at the break before closing from 10th to finish fifth in a one-mile allowance on the turf at Keeneland.
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Julia Shining launches what could be the start of a significant campaign Sunday when she returns to action in a second-level allowance at Aqueduct.
The Grade 2 winner is part of a field of eight fillies and mares in the one-turn mile that goes as the eighth race. Her rivals include stakes winner Ringy Dingy, who was cross-entered in the Safely Kept that was to have been run Saturday at Laurel Park, and Golden Degree, winner of what has become a key allowance in her most recent start Oct. 4.
