The $100,000 Honey Ryder for 3-year old fillies and $100,000 English Channel for sophomore colts and geldings share top billing on Saturday at Gulfstream Park. Both races will be contested at one mile over turf.
The 11-race card begins at 1:10 p.m. Eastern and concludes with the English Channel at 6:05 p.m.
Emerald Downs will begin its 55-day spring-summer meeting on Saturday with a new weekend post time of 1:30 p.m. Pacific. Opening day coincides with the 150th running of the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs. Post time for the Kentucky Derby is set for 3:57 p.m.
A Fabulous Hat and Best Dressed Contest will augment the Derby Day festivities at Emerald Downs with $1,000 in prizes to be divided among several different categories and age groups. The deadline to enter the contest is 2:30 p.m.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – When nominations were released for Saturday’s $1 million Churchill Downs Stakes, one horse one horse in particular was not on the list – trainer Brad Cox’s Zozos. But when entries were drawn for the race, not only was Zozos’s name called out, he was ultimately made the 3-1 morning-line favorite for the prestigious, seven-furlong Grade 1 dash for older horses.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – A half-length has separated Vahva and Alva Starr both times they’ve met. Vahva finished on top in last October’s Raven Run. Alva Starr flipped the script in last month’s Grade 1 Madison.
Round 3 in this budding rivalry comes Saturday in the Grade 1, $1 million Derby City Distaff at Churchill Downs going seven furlongs.
Alva Starr hadn’t won at seven furlongs until she beat Vahva in the Madison. A front-running sort most of her career, Alva Starr sat slightly off the pace under Tyler Gaffalione in the Madison.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The Grade 2, $600,000 American Turf on Saturday at Churchill Downs became much more wide open when the connections of multiple graded stakes winner Endlessly, who likely would have been favored, opted to take their chances in the Kentucky Derby.
The 1 1/16-mile race for 3-year-olds drew an overflow group of 17, with 14 in the main body of the field, plus three also-eligibles. The starting group includes four graded stakes winners, in addition to six others who have won stakes.
Post Time will be moving back to the distance that produced his best career Beyer Speed Figure on Friday, when he seeks to win his fifth consecutive stakes race in the Grade 3, $175,000 Westchester at the Belmont at Aqueduct meet.
The offering for 4-year-olds and up at a one-turn mile drew seven runners, including Charge It, a Grade 2 winner making his first start since running fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile in November.
CHURCHILL DOWNS
Wednesday, May 1
Weather: Clear
Temperature: 58 degrees
Track: Fast
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The final countdown has begun to Oaks and Derby 2024 with the goal for the connections of all contenders to just keep their horses happy and sound until their respective races on Friday and Saturday.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Dornoch has dealt with a foot issue known as a quarter crack through most of his career. Given his race record – three wins and two seconds from six starts – it has not been an impediment to success.
Noted farrier Ian McKinlay has examined Dornoch before each of his last three races – starting with the Grade 2 Remsen last December, which he won – and has done whatever work necessary to have the foot in racing condition. On Wednesday, McKinlay was at Churchill Downs where he laced, with wires, the top part of the crack, which is on the right front foot.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Kantex will be looking to improve upon her outstanding 5-for-7 record at Oaklawn Park on Friday, when she attempts to nail down her first win at two turns in the $150,000 Natural State Breeders’.
The one-mile race ends at the sixteenth pole and is for fillies and mares bred in Arkansas. It has drawn a field of 10, including last year’s winner, Kaboom Baby.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The first thing that happens when someone breeds a Thoroughbred racehorse is they wait. It will take at least two years, bare minimum, from the time a foal hits the ground until it races. Buy a yearling, in September, say, and months and months of waiting still lie ahead. And after all that waiting, how many owners and breeders in an age of instant gratification want to wait some more, while a horse figures out how to race, how to win?
