ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Trainer Bill Mott won the inaugural Woodbine Mile in 1997 with Geri. On Sunday, he will have his best chance since in the $1 million turf race when he saddles favored Courageous Cat in the 15th running of the successful prep for the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile.
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ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Trainer Todd Pletcher won last year’s $250,000 Summer Stakes with the brilliant Pluck, who went on to capture the Grade 2 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf. He has another potential rocket for Saturday’s renewal of the Grade 3 event at Woodbine, Finale, who captured his two turf races by a combined 16 lengths.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario —Trainer Mark Casse will run four nice prospects – Northern Passion, Sky Dreamer, Spirited Miss, and Quality Lass – in Saturday’s $200,000 Natalma, a one-mile turf stakes at Woodbine. The Grade 3 event for 2-year-old fillies is a Breeders’ Cup Win and You’re In race, with the winner gaining inclusion and a paid trip to the BC Juvenile Fillies Turf at Churchill Downs on Nov. 4.
Saturday’s card at Woodbine features a pair of one-mile turf races for 2-year-olds which are part of the Breeders’ Cup Win and You’re In challenge series.
Both the $250,000 Summer and the $200,000 Natalma, which is for 2-year-old fillies, offer Grade 3 status and attracted fields of eight and 13, respectively.
Last year, trainer Todd Pletcher sent out Pluck to win the Summer and More Than Real to run second in the Natalma and watched both come back to capture their respective turf events on the Friday Breeders’ Cup card at Churchill Downs.
The next start for top California sprinter Smiling Tiger will be the Breeders’ Cup Sprint, according to trainer Jeff Bonde.
“He won’t race again until the Breeders’ Cup; he’ll train up to the race on works,” the trainer said this week from Keeneland.
Sarafina won her third race in a row, bulling between horses deep in the stretch run to win the Prix Foy by a head over the Japanese horse Hiruno d’Amour and cement her position as one of the favorites for the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe in three weeks.
BOSSIER CITY, La.- Trainer Bob Baffert said on Sunday morning that Prayer for Relief has put himself in position for a start in the Breeders’ Cup Classic after winning his third consecutive graded stakes in the Super Derby on Saturday. The horse wired the field in the Grade 2, $500,000 race at Louisiana Downs, and earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 98. The number equaled the career-best figure he had put up one start earlier in the Grade 2 West Virginia Derby.
Defending Breeders’ Cup Marathon champion Eldaafer, racing at a distance far shorter than he will be asked to go later this fall, had to settle for second behind runaway winner Not Abroad in Saturday’s $84,000 Governors Day Stakes at Delaware Park.
Masked Marvel gave the trainer-jockey team of John Gosden and William Buick a second straight success in the Group 1 St. Leger Stakes on Saturday, winning the test of stamina at Doncaster in England by three lengths a year after Arctic Cosmos had scored in the race for 3-year-olds.
It was the fourth win from six starts but first Group 1 tally for Masked Marvel, a son of Montjeu owned by Bjorn Nielsen. Masked Marvel failed to show his best in the Epsom Derby, finishing eighth, but long had the St. Leger as a target, according to Gosden, who won the race for the fourth time.
The Group 1 Prix Niel for 3-year-olds over 1 1/2 miles on Sunday at Longchamp in Paris is a Breeders’ Cup Challenge Win and You’re In race, meaning the race winner gains an automatic berth in the Breeders’ Cup Turf as well as $20,000 in travel expenses to ship to Churchill Downs for the race. But the BC Turf probably does not sit foremost in the mind of the trainer of the likely race favorite, Meandre.
