Prominent owner and breeder Josephine Abercrombie, 95, died peacefully at her home on Pin Oak Stud in Versailles, Ky., on Jan. 5, just 10 days shy of her birthday.
“Josephine greeted every new day of her extraordinary life with the quest to see what came next,” an obituary released Wednesday evening described her.
Da Hoss, who famously returned from a long layoff to become a two-time winner of the Breeders' Cup Mile, died Sunday at the Kentucky Horse Park near Lexington. The Gone West gelding, who had just turned 30, had resided at the Park's Hall of Champions since 2000.
The New York Racing Association has produced an amended complaint against the trainer Bob Baffert that adds references to two positives for the regulated medication phenylbutazone from 2019 and a barn search conducted by the California Horse Racing Board shortly thereafter, according to a copy of the complaint.
Rombauer, last year’s Preakness winner, was announced as retired Monday in a press release by John Fradkin, who bred and owns the colt with his wife, Diane.
According to Fradkin, Rombauer had filling in his ankles following his last start, the Belmont Stakes, necessitating time off, and the issues flared anew following recent workouts at Santa Anita.
“His condition got worse to the point where we feel it’s best to stop on him,” Fradkin said in the release.
Longtime Ontario owner Bob Harvey died unexpectedly on Dec. 23 at 83.
Born in Sudbury and raised in South Porcupine, Ontario, Harvey was a sharp entrepreneur who loved sports. In 1984, Harvey established Cooksville Tire, successfully focusing on the commercial, passenger and agricultural tire market in southern Ontario.
Harvey headed the partnership which owned Numerous Times, who was victorious in the Grade 1 Atto Mile in 2001 for trainer Sid Attard. Numerous Times was voted the Sovereign Award for Canadian champion male grass runner that same year.
Billy Turner, who in 1977 trained Seattle Slew to become the first undefeated Triple Crown winner, died Friday from cancer while at his home in Reddick, Fla. He was 81.
Though Turner trained several graded stakes winners throughout his five-decade career, he is best known as the first conditioner of Seattle Slew, a $17,500 yearling purchase who became champion 2- and 3-year-old and was Horse of the Year in 1977.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Led by two-time Eclipse Award winner Julien Leparoux, five riders who have combined to win more than 19,000 races were announced by Santa Anita on Wednesday as the finalists for the 2022 George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award.
Leparoux’s fellow finalists are Joe Bravo, Glenn Corbett, Rodney Prescott, and Tim Thornton.
ARCADIA, Calif. – As good as Flightline looked in person and on video in the Grade 1 Runhappy Malibu Stakes on Sunday at Santa Anita, he did even better on paper.
Flightline earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 118 for the Malibu, the best figure assigned to any horse this year, eclipsing the 114 that Flightline and Baby Yoda had earned in races in September in allowance sprints at Del Mar and Saratoga, respectively.
ARCADIA, Calif. – In a sense, Sunday’s blockbuster program is the first true opening day of a winter meeting at Santa Anita in three years.
For decades, Santa Anita’s opener has held a unique place on the day after Christmas on the Los Angeles sporting calendar. The last two years have not been kind. In 2019, opening day was postponed for 48 hours because of extensive rain on Christmas Day. The rearranged opening day drew an ontrack crowd of 35,085.
