Veteran jockey Joe Talamo is taking a brief hiatus from riding while spending time with his family in Louisville, Ky., he said on Thursday afternoon.

Talamo last rode at Santa Anita on Oct. 4 and said he has no definite plans to return to riding in the short-term.

“I’m enjoying time off,” he said. “I’ve been laying low, enjoying hanging out with the family.”

Talamo, 33, has won 2,343 races in a career that began in 2006, when he was 16. Talamo won the Eclipse Award as the outstanding apprentice jockey of 2007.

Trainer Aidan O’Brien said on Friday that he plans to send 11 horses to Del Mar for the Breeders’ Cup on Nov. 1-2, and that eight of his pre-entered runners will remain in Ireland.

O’Brien’s team is led by the outstanding 3-year-old City of Troy, who will start on dirt for the first time in the $7 million Breeders’ Cup Classic at 1 1/4 miles, the showcase race of the two-day series.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Sunday’s $100,000 Overskate Stakes at Woodbine could be the final race for 2021 Woodbine Mile winner Town Cruise. It also marks the one-year anniversary of Perfect Crime’s victory in the 7 1/2-furlong inner turf event. Neither will be favored Sunday, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see them both run well.

The days are getting shorter, and the 2024 racing calendar is winding down – the Breeders’ Cup will be key to deciding divisional championships, and only five Grade 1 flat races remain in the United States outside of that event this year. However, this is a sport with no true offseason, and there’s always plenty to look forward to, especially as some 2-year-olds begin to map out their late-fall and winter campaigns toward the 2025 spring classics.

Spirit of St Louis paid the price for winning five consecutive stakes when he had to carry 126 pounds, conceding six pounds to Dakota Gold, in the West Point Stakes at Saratoga, a race he ultimately lost to Dakota Gold by a nose.

Following a decent try in Grade 1 company last out, Spirit of St Louis is back with New York-breds and back at level weights with Dakota Gold when the two meet again in Sunday’s $200,000 Mohawk Stakes at Aqueduct.

When Drake’s Passage lost last year’s Empire Classic as the favorite, he was running back in 23 days off a fairly strong race, albeit a loss. When Drake’s Passage runs in Sunday’s 49th renewal of the $250,000 Empire Classic at Aqueduct, he will do so off a near three-month layoff and coming off the worst race of his career.

That he has run well fresh and may have had a big excuse in his last race could lead handicappers to give Drake’s Passage another try in the Empire Classic, which drew a field of nine going 1 1/8 miles.

Breeder, owner, and trainer Tony Duran will have a special angel in his corner Saturday when he starts a handful of runners on the Indiana Champions Day card at Horseshoe Indianapolis, led by Dattts Life in the $250,000 Unreachable Star Handicap.

The race is the richest of the card’s four Thoroughbred stakes for Indiana-sired and Indiana-bred runners. There’s also a pair of $55,000 overnight handicaps on the 13-race card and six stakes for Quarter Horses.

A Tres of Eagle will be looking to win the Grade 1, $277,975 American Quarter Horse Association Challenge Championship for the second year in a row Saturday night, when he makes his first start at the Downs at Albuquerque.

The 440-yard race for 3-year-olds and up is the richest of five graded stakes making up the Challenge Championships. The traveling series is being showcased on a 10-race card made up exclusively of stakes races. First post is 6:05 p.m. Mountain. Purses for the Challenge Championship races are worth a cumulative $830,250.

On paper, Hello Hello Hello looks like the horse to beat in the $95,000 Our Dear Peggy Stakes for 2-year-old fillies on the grass Saturday at Gulfstream Park. But some handicappers may find reason enough to side against the likely favorite in a race that serves as the final leg of a Rainbow 6 sequence featuring a mandatory payout of a pool that should exceed $1 million if not hit on Friday.