SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Sierra Leone turned in his penultimate work for the Belmont Stakes on Saturday over the Oklahoma training track at Saratoga, breezing five furlongs in 1:02.53 in company with Domestic Product, per Daily Racing Form. Shortly thereafter, trainer Chad Brown announced that Flavien Prat would replace Tyler Gaffalione aboard the Kentucky Derby runner-up in the final leg of the Triple Crown.
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DRF Past Performances
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Some may argue that Mike Repole owns the best 3-year-old in the country even in the wake of reigning juvenile champion and Florida Derby winner Fierceness’s 15th-place finish in the Kentucky Derby. That horse would be the undefeated and untested Mindframe, who registered a 103 Beyer Speed Figure in his debut and has captured his only two starts by a combined 21 1/4 lengths.
Seize the Grey, the Preakness winner, will run in the $2 million Belmont Stakes on June 8 at Saratoga, trainer D. Wayne Lukas confirmed Tuesday afternoon.
“He bounced back really well, exceptional,” Lukas said Tuesday though he had hinted on Sunday he was leaning toward running. “[Bob] Baffert and I were looking at him [Sunday] and Baffert couldn’t believe how he held his flesh.”
The Blood-Horse was the first to report the news.
BALTIMORE – Once a coach, always a coach.
Whether it be in his days as a high school basketball coach in Wisconsin, or the long list of successful trainers he’s sent out in the world of Thoroughbred racing, D. Wayne Lukas has always gotten enjoyment out of coaching.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Balnikhov’s victory in the Grade 3 Dinner Party Stakes at Pimlico on Saturday gave the 5-year-old gelding a victory in the first of a three-race series over the next eight months that encompasses races at Santa Anita and Gulfstream Park.
A sweep of the series is worth a $2.5 million bonus. The problem is one of the races is held at Santa Anita on a turf course Balnikhov does not seem to prefer.
ARCADIA, Calif. - An expensive colt who was little more than a supporting player in the 3-year-old stakes of late winter and early spring may be a runner to follow this summer.
Mc Vay, seventh of eight in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby on April 6, rebounded to win a maiden race at a mile by an eye-catching seven lengths at Santa Anita on Saturday.
The win left trainer John Shirreffs considering a start for Mc Vay in the $100,000 Affirmed Stakes for 3-year-olds at 1 1/16 miles on June 9.
“It sounds reasonable,” Shirreffs said.
Sun, 05/19/2024 - 13:57
The Golden State Racing meeting at the Alameda County Fair in Pleasanton, Calif., this fall will offer approximately $170,000 per day in purses and will run largely on a Friday-through-Sunday basis for nine weeks from Oct. 19 to Dec. 15, according to an agreement reached earlier this month between the Thoroughbred Owners of California and a consortium of executives and horsemen that will operate the race season.
ARCADIA, Calif. – A runaway comeback win by California-based Anywho in a Churchill Downs allowance sets her up for a return to stakes races, including an early-summer clash with Tamara at Los Alamitos.
Anywho, trained by John Sadler and owned by Hronis Racing, shipped to Churchill for a second-level allowance sprint on May 17, her first start since September. “There wasn’t a (local) race, and she was really good and ready to go,” Sadler said. The circuitous path – from Santa Anita to Churchill Downs to prep for a stake at Los Alamitos – was economically feasible.
Total betting on Saturday’s Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore was up 6.7 percent compared to last year, when handle on the race suffered from a short field, according to charts of the races.
Total betting on the race, including all multi-race bets ending in the Preakness, was $57.93 million this year, a far cry from the $68.69 million record set in 2021. However, the total was up $3.8 million over last year’s race, where a field of seven horses led to steep declines in the single-race exotic pools, such as the exacta, trifecta, and superfecta.
BALTIMORE, Md. — Saturday’s Preakness Stakes card is still set to begin at 10:30 a.m. at a drizzly Pimlico Race Course, having not been affected by a minor incident the fire department responded to at the facility late Friday night.
A dryer in the basement of the facility where linens are washed began smoking late in the evening, following the Friday card which concluded at about 6:30 p.m. According to spokesperson David Joseph, this triggered the fire alarms, a response from the local fire department, and a building evacuation.