Following an encouraging start to the yearling season, Fasig-Tipton has cataloged 240 selected yearlings for its boutique Saratoga sale, set for the evenings of Aug. 5-6.
According to the company, the catalog includes half- or full siblings to 57 graded/group stakes winners.
“Saratoga offers the highest concentration of quality of any yearling sale in the world,” said Boyd Browning Jr., president and CEO of Fasig Tipton.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – The speedy Maakwa found new life in his last two outings going 1 1/16 miles. He will cut back to seven-eighths in Friday’s seventh race at Woodbine, a conditioned allowance with $50,000 claiming option.
Maakwa won two Ontario-sired allowance races in his formative years before going into a prolonged slump, during which he would often break slowly. When going long for the first time in his penultimate start, the 6-year-old set a fast pace before weakening late to end up second.
Elevado will take advantage of his eligibility and drop into a $10,000 starter allowance going 6 1/2 furlongs on Friday at Emerald Downs.
Elevado, claimed in March at Santa Anita for $10,000, has been competitive locally at the $25,000 claiming level. Friday’s race affords Elevado, trained by Hilario Perez, the chance to face softer company without fear of being claimed while presumably having an edge.
Jose Ortiz hopes to carry the momentum of a highly successful Churchill Downs meet into Saratoga where he hopes to contend for a fourth riding title when the meet opens Thursday.
“I’m competitive, the goal would be leading rider or at least win as many races as I can,” Ortiz said during a rare 2024 visit to Aqueduct.
Nutella Fella, last year’s Grade 1 Hopeful winner, who ran third in his 3-year-old debut in the Grade 1 Woody Stephens last month, is sidelined again due to an ankle issue, trainer Gary Contessa said Sunday.
Contessa said Nutella Fella had some filling in his left hind ankle, the same ankle he injured last fall which forced him to miss the remainder of the year following his upset Hopeful score. A subsequent PET scan of the area showed some bone bruising in his left hind leg.
Trainer Linda Rice won the first race of the 2023 Saratoga meet and the last, and a whole bunch of races in between, which enabled her to tie Chad Brown for the most wins at the meet with 35. It was the second time Rice had won or shared the Saratoga crown, having done so outright in 2009.
Rice is not going to Saratoga this week confident she can contend again this summer.
Whit Beckman will have a 13-horse string at Saratoga this summer, one that includes the 3-year-old Honor Marie, who is targeting the Grade 1, $1.25 million Travers Stakes on Aug. 24.
Honor Marie finished second in the Louisiana Derby, which helped get him into the Kentucky Derby, where he finished eighth. Most recently, he finished fourth in the Belmont Stakes here in June. Honor Marie returned to the work tab at Churchill Downs on Saturday, breezing a half-mile in 50.60 seconds.
Trainer Jose D’Angelo will have a bigger presence at Saratoga this summer than in years past with a 20-horse string.
“I know it’s a very important meet,” said D’Angelo, who ranks 11th in wins nationally this year with 78,. “I have horses that I think fit perfectly over there. We’re going to try to do good over there.”
Last summer, D’Angelo – who also maintains strings in Florida and New Jersey – had about six stalls at Saratoga and won one race from 17 starters. The previous year, he won two races, mostly shipping in.
Sure, the horses still run left-handed around a flat oval track there, but Colonial Downs marches to a drummer hitting the off beats.
The rural Virginia racecourse opens a 27-day racing season Thursday – with three steeplechase races.
In late June, Colonial sent out a press release urging horsemen to investigate the Virginia status of their stock: Colonial’s first condition book includes 46 races categorized as “Virginia-restricted,” races open to any horse that spent six months in the state before they turned 2, an unusual eligibility condition.
