Trainer Todd Pletcher got a graded stakes win and unleashed two stakes-bound first-time starters over the course of the Friday and Saturday cards at Monmouth Park. 

Mandaloun continued his preparations for the upcoming Grade 2, $750,000 Stephen Foster on July 2 at Churchill Downs with a strong six-furlong breeze early Sunday morning. Churchill Downs clocker John Nichols caught the 4-year-old colt in 1:12.40.

All-sources handle in California trailed 2021 figures through May, according to a report at Thursday’s California Horse Racing Board meeting.

Handle at Thoroughbred tracks, the harness meeting at Sacramento and the mixed meeting at Los Alamitos was a combined $1.29 billion through May 31, a decline of 2 percent compared to $1.31 billion in 2021.

Handle on Thoroughbred meetings at Golden Gate Fields and Santa Anita was $1.145 billion through May 31 compared to $1.148 billion in 2021.

Cilla has been named the Louisiana-bred horse of the year for 2021, according to an announcement from the Louisiana Thoroughbred Breeders Association. 

Cilla won 4 of 8 starts last year, including the Grade 2 Prioress at Saratoga in September. She also won stakes at Monmouth Park and Evangeline Downs. Her earnings last year topped $300,000. 

The LTBA board of directors selects the horse of the year from the winners of its divisional awards. 

Cilla was the first North American winner and stakes winner for her sire, California Chrome, according to the LTBA. 

A shed row at Horseshoe Indianapolis in Shelbyville, Ind., has been placed under quarantine after two horses based in the barn tested positive for strangles, a highly contagious bacterial infection, according to a track official.

Eric Halstrom, the general manager at Horseshoe, said the two horses were removed from the barn prior to being tested for the disease, which affects the upper respiratory tract. They subsequently tested positive.

King Ottoman has a couple of different upcoming stakes options following his breakout win last month in the $300,000 Texas Derby at Lone Star Park.

Trainer Steve Asmussen said Tuesday that King Ottoman is being considered for a start in either the Grade 3, $500,000 Ohio Derby or the Grade 3, $300,000 Indiana Derby.

The Ohio Derby is a 1 1/8-mile race June 25 at Thistledown. The Indiana Derby will be run over 1 1/16 miles July 9 at Horseshoe Indianapolis.

After Mo Donegal earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 98 winning the Belmont Stakes, some readers looked at the data for the day and questioned whether that number should be higher.

Mo Donegal ran the 1 1/2 miles of the Belmont in 2:28.28. Earlier in the card, some of the best older long-distance runners in the East contested the prestigious Brooklyn Stakes, and Fearless won it in a slow 2:30.45. He received a Beyer Figure of 95. Mo Donegal ran significantly faster than Fearless; so why didn’t he get a significantly higher figure?

After a Triple Crown season that saw a different horse prevail in all three jewels, plus a horse who ran second in the first two make a case that he might have been best in both, the 3-year-old male division heads into the second half of the year without a clear-cut leader. That makes for several anticipated, compelling showdowns in coming months for divisional honors.

Betting on this year’s Triple Crown races started with a bang but ended with a whimper.

Although betting on the Kentucky Derby set a record this year, consistent with trends stretching back two decades, betting on the Preakness and the Belmont declined. The Preakness lost some of its luster when the longshot Derby winner, Rich Strike, passed on the race, and though Rich Strike returned to run in the third leg of the Triple Crown, the series had by then seemed to slip its moorings, populated by an ever-changing cast of characters that failed to grip the imagination.

ELMONT, N.Y. - Flightline, the uber-impressive winner of Saturday’s Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap at Belmont Park, was scheduled to return to Southern California on Tuesday and his connections will wait a while before deciding on where he will make his next start.