CHICAGO – The Illinois Racing Board on Monday, citing continuing unresolved financial concerns, suspended the state-issued license permitting Suburban Downs in near-suburban Chicago to operate a racetrack.

Suburban Downs is the name Hawthorne Race Course uses to operate the Standardbred side of the track’s racing operations, and Monday’s action imperils Hawthorne’s Thoroughbred season, scheduled to span 63 racing days from late March through November.

ARCADIA, Calif. - California trainer Marcelo Polanco needed slightly more than 24 hours at Santa Anita on Friday and Saturday to equal his win total for 2025.

On Friday, Gran Oriente, a Group 1 winner in Chile last May, won for the first time in the United States in an allowance race at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course. Gran Oriente paid $19.80 to win.

On Saturday, Queen Sienna, a minor stakes winner in Peru in 2024 and 2025, won an allowance race for fillies and mares at 1 1/8 miles on turf, her third start in this country. She paid $24.60.

Veteran Quarter Horse jockey Cruz Mendez sustained a spinal cord injury in a spill at Los Alamitos on Saturday, and was undergoing surgery at a nearby hospital on Sunday afternoon, according to two of his friends.

There is concern that Mendez has sustained paralysis in his legs, they said.

Mendez was aboard Imm Relentless in the fifth race on Saturday evening when the filly sustained an injury and fell nearing the finish of a 400-yard time trial. Imm Relentless was euthanized because of an apparent back injury, according to a racing official.

The stakes winners Litmus Test and Strategic Risk will lead a competitive field of 14 in the Grade 3, $1 million Southwest Stakes, which has been moved to next Friday, Feb. 6, after Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark., announced Tuesday that racing this weekend has been canceled due to freezing temperatures.

The track called off its Friday, Saturday, and Sunday cards.

The Southwest, which was originally scheduled for Saturday, is a Kentucky Derby points race (20-10-6-4-2) and will be showcased on a 12-race card that has a special morning post of 11:30 a.m. Central.

Umberto Rispoli, the leading rider at the current Santa Anita winter-spring meeting, underwent surgery on Sunday morning to stabilize a broken ankle sustained when he was unseated in a race at Gulfstream Park on Saturday, according to his agent Matt Nakatani.

Rispoli was aboard Unconquerable Keen, who clipped heels in the stretch of the $175,000 Gulfstream Park Turf Sprint. Rispoli fell from the left side of Unconquerable Keen and suffered a fractured ankle, tibia and fibula.

HALLANDALE, Fla. - Trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. had one word to describe his feelings the morning after sending out Skippylongstocking and White Abarrio to finish first and second respectively in Saturday’s $3 million Pegasus World Cup Invitational. 

“Relief!”

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Trainer Graham Motion will look to keep Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Turf winner Test Score at 1 1/8 miles for future races, and one of the mid-season targets could be the Grade 1 Turf Classic at Churchill Downs on Kentucky Derby Day. 

“That would be logical timing-wise, and he’s run well there, too,” said Motion, in a reference to Test Score running a solid second in the Grade 2 American Turf at Churchill last Derby Day. 

Consistently poor weather has impacted Law School’s training regimen at Parx Racing, but trainer Jamie Ness remains confident that the 3-year-old filly can make some noise in New York or Maryland in the near future.

“We really think a lot of her,” Ness said this week. “She's a young filly getting better. Once we stretched her out, she just turned the corner, which I knew she would. I think we haven't seen the best of her yet.”

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Madaket Road will scratch from Saturday’s $3 million Pegasus World Cup Invitational at Gulfstream Park, per Tom Ryan, Managing Partner for SF Racing. Ryan and SF Racing are among Madaket Road's many owners, a group that includes Starlight Racing and Madaket Stables.