Trainer Joe Sharp has been suspended 30 days after five horses he trained tested positive for the de-worming medication levamisole in late 2019, according to stewards’ rulings posted on the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission website.
Sharp will serve the suspension from Feb. 12-March 13, according to the rulings. The horses that tested positive all raced within a 16-day period at Churchill Downs in November, 2019. All of the horses were disqualified from their races.
Authentic is favored to be named Horse of the Year and champion 3-year-old male, and his connections – trainer Bob Baffert, jockey John Velazquez, breeder Peter Blum, and an ownership group headed by Spendthrift Farm – all are finalists in their respective categories for the 50th annual Eclipse Awards, to be announced Thursday night in an unusual presentation that serves as an appropriate coda to an unusual year.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Eight weeks after the first pool was held, no fewer than 14 new names are in the 23-horse lineup for Pool 2 of the 2021 Kentucky Derby Future Wager, which opens Friday at noon Eastern for the customary three-day run.
Authentic, winner of the Kentucky Derby and Breeders’ Cup Classic, the top older horse Improbable, and the top older mare Monomoy Girl are the finalists for the 2020 Horse of the Year, it was announced Saturday by the three organizations which vote for the Eclipse Awards, the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, Daily Racing Form, and National Turf Writers and Broadcasters.
The first-ever internationally based winner of the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint was a 4-year-old filly whose name and prior record evoked images of Cinderella. The victory was sufficiently impressive to land her among the Eclipse Awards finalists in the female sprinter category.
Ninety-four starters, 30 winners for a 31 percent strike rate. Those are great numbers for a trainer at any level and even over a relatively short stretch of time. Now, try to imagine those stats cover only graded stakes races during a full calendar year and you’ll see just what kind of 2020 Brad Cox put together.
Even a global pandemic that warped the 2020 racing season couldn’t stop Bob Baffert training the winner of the Kentucky Derby presented by Woodford Reserve.
Baffert gets the biggest, strongest, fastest colts to train. He gets them because he has won the Derby so often and twice swept the Triple Crown.
Having horses for major Saturday races at, say, Saratoga, gives a trainer a chance to win an Eclipse Award. Having horses for minor weekday races in Oklahoma, in Arkansas and Kentucky, in Texas and Indiana, can get a trainer 422 wins in a season. One trainer – and only one trainer – in North America plays both games.
That person is Steve Asmussen, and Asmussen, winning races from the bottom of the class ladder to the very top rung, is an Eclipse Award finalist for 2020.
Alexander Crispin made his presence felt in his rookie year of riding and is an Eclipse Award finalist for outstanding apprentice jockey of 2020.
Crispin racked up 103 wins from 589 starts last year, while his mounts earned a collective $2,194,030. The wins and earnings numbers ranked second among apprentice riders in 2020.
A scroll through the social-media posts by apprentice jockey Yarmarie L. Correa features win picture after win picture after win picture.
The rookie rider collected 117 of them last year to lead all apprentice jockeys by wins in North America. She had 701 mounts, and they earned a cumulative $1,751,390. Correa also won the riding title at Thistledown.
For her impressive first season on the track, Correa is an Eclipse Award finalist for outstanding apprentice jockey of 2020.
