Making Amends also breezed five furlongs for Casse on Friday, going in company in 1:01.20 with Jason Hoyte aboard, preparing for Saturday’s Summer Stakes at Woodbine
The $250,000 Summer and its sister feature, the Grade 3 Natalma, both are one-mile turf races which offer Grade 3 status and are part of the Breeders’ Cup Challenge Win and You’re In series.
BREEDERS’ CUP CHALLENGE: Racing schedule, replays, and past winners >>
Live Video |
Saturday’s card at the Curragh features the Group 1 National Stakes at seven furlongs for 2-year-olds, a Breeders’ Cup Challenge Win and You’re In race for the BC Juvenile Turf. The National is set to go with a field of nine, with Power and Dragon Pulse the two antepost favorites in the betting.
Hopeful winner Currency Swap returned to his Monmouth Park base on Tuesday, but will not return to the track until the beginning of next week as his connections consider what to do next with their undefeated 2-year-old colt.
Trainer Terri Pompay said that Currency Swap “was a little tired” coming out of Monday’s Hopeful but by Friday morning “he was playing a little bit.” Pompay said that Currency Swap will just be ridden around the shed this weekend before returning to the track next week.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Like the swallows returning to San Juan Capistrano every year, so it seems does Bob Baffert win the Del Mar Futurity.
Baffert did it again on Wednesday, winning the Grade 1, $250,000 Futurity for the 10th time in its last 16 runnings, this time with Drill, who survived a bumpy stretch run to prevail in the closing-day feature at Del Mar.
Goldikova will make her next start in the Prix de la Foret on Oct. 2 at Longchamp as she prepares to attempt a fourth straight win in the Breeders’ Cup Mile.
Since finishing second in the Aug. 15 Prix Jacques le Marois, Goldikova had been tentatively pointed to Sunday’s Prix du Moulin, but trainer Freddie Head announced a change in plans this past weekend. Instead of the Moulin, Goldikova will go instead for the Foret, the race she used as a bridge to the Breeders’ Cup the last two years.
Ben's Cat and rider Jeremy Rose stormed through the lane to edge Perfect Officer by a half-length in the Grade 3, $350,000 Turf Monster at five furlongs on Monday at Parx Racing.
The victory in the Turf Monster, a Breeders' Cup Challenge Win and You're In event, ensures Ben's Cat a fees-paid spot in the BC Turf Sprint in November at Churchill Downs.
It also gave the 5-year-old gelding a sweep of the state's top grass sprints. Ben's Cat won the Pennsylvania Governor's Cup at Penn National in his previous start.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – In the ultimate local-girl-makes-good story, trainer Terri Pompay, a Saratoga native, won her first Grade 1 stakes Monday when Currency Swap wore down pacesetting longshot Trinniberg in the final strides to win the $250,000 Hopeful Stakes for 2-year-olds by three-quarters of a length.
It was 3 3/4 lengths back to Big Blue Nation in third. He was followed in the order of finish by Laurie’s Rocket, Power World, I’ll Have Another, Hunt Crossing, Vexor, and Clip the Coupons.
MIAMI. - In the end, class will usually prevail.
And so it did when reigning sprint champion Big Drama returned from an 8 ½- month layoff to easily defeat the red-hot but outclassed Black Diamond Cat and two other rivals in Sunday’s $75,000 Whippleton Handicap at Calder.
Trainer David Fawkes plans to use Sunday’s race as the first of two preps before sending Big Drama back to Churchill Downs to defend his title in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint later this fall.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Weemissfrankie’s win in the Grade 1 Del Mar Debutante on Saturday has left trainer Peter Eurton thinking of the Breeders’ Cup at Churchill Downs in November, and not just the BC Juvenile Fillies.
The Juvenile Fillies Turf race is being considered, although Eurton indicated that a decision hinges on how Weemissfrankie runs in her next scheduled start, the $250,000 Oak Leaf Stakes over 1 1/16 miles at Santa Anita on Oct. 2.
