As one of the sharpest jockey agents in the history of racing, Ron Anderson has won plenty of tight photos in major races over the years, but his closest call came a little more than a year ago, and it wasn’t even on the track.
Anderson was experiencing some pressure in his chest and was summoned to his doctor’s office to do a treadmill test. The rest is a blur – into an ambulance, right to the hospital, then surgery for a quadruple bypass the next morning.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Lani may be shedding his reputation as the bad boy of the Triple Crown.
A horse who gave his handlers fits before the Kentucky Derby, would act studdish around fillies and mares, and was tough around the gate, Lani has been on his best behavior at Belmont Park.
If he didn’t wear a saddle towel with his name on it and didn’t make four laps around the track every day, it would be hard to distinguish him from any other horse.
BELMONT PARK
Track: Fast
Weather: Clear
Temp.: 74
ELMONT, N.Y. – About the only impressions Lani made while training at Churchill Downs in the weeks leading up to the Kentucky Derby were negative ones. In fact, his temperament was such that he was given permission to leave the paddock well in advance of his 19 rivals in Kentucky Derby for both his own safety and that of the large crowd in the saddling enclosure.
Trainer Larry Rivelli won the 1,000th race of his career when Good Bye Greg captured the eighth race Monday at Arlington.
Rivelli, 45, has been training since 2000 and has won the Arlington training title three times. He won 96 races in 2010, then the highest annual total in his career, but surpassed that mark with 114 winners in 2015.
“It feels great,” said Rivelli, who also won the Honor the Hero Stakes at Canterbury on Monday with Richies Sweetheart. “I couldn’t have done it without all my people.”
Creator will try a new distance at a new track with a new rider when he competes in the Belmont Stakes on June 11.
Creator, who won the Arkansas Derby before a troubled 13th-place finish in the Kentucky Derby, will make his first start at Belmont Park in the last and longest of the Triple Crown races, the 1 1/2-mile Belmont Stakes, and he’ll be ridden by New York-based Irad Ortiz Jr., who was announced on Monday as Creator’s Belmont jockey.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Mario Pino has ridden 40,885 mounts in a career that spans five decades. He remembers an encounter with another jockey at Belmont Park about a week before he rode his first race.
Someone introduced Pino to Mike Venezia, a regular on this circuit in the late 1970s and 1980s.
A single bettor failed to hit the Golden Pick 6 at Golden Gate Fields for the 51st straight day on Saturday, and the carryover has risen to $1,065,284.
The Golden Pick 6 pays off when one single ticket hits the jackpot-style wager. The Golden Pick 6 currently has the largest jackpot of any wager in North American horse racing.
Trainer Jerry Hollendorfer recorded his 3,000th victory at Golden Gate Fields on Saturday when Tiz’s All Star ($9.40) made her debut a winning one in a five-furlong, $20,000 maiden claiming race.
Hollendorfer, 69, a Hall of Fame trainer, has won a total of 7,095 races in North America, third on the all-time list behind the late Dale Baird (9,445) and Steve Asmussen, who leads active trainers with 7,305 wins.
Hollendorfer’s 3,000 victories at Golden Gate alone would rank No. 30 on the all-time list for trainers.
The Golden Pick 6 jackpot carryover at Golden Gate Fields has risen to $1,019,784 after there was no single winning ticket to hit the jackpot for the 50th straight racing day Friday.
On Friday, with four odds-on winners plus a pair of 3-1 shots, fans who selected all six winners in the 20-cent wager received $33.04 payouts.
The Golden Pick 6 currently has the largest jackpot of any wager in North American horse racing.
Jockey Sophie Doyle is expected to be out six to eight weeks after sustaining a broken right collarbone in a spill in the first race Thursday at Churchill Downs.
Doyle was aboard Showered when the 4-year-old gelding clipped heels in tight quarters and fell after turning for home in the $8,000 claiming race. Trainer Anthony Hamilton Jr. reported Showered had to be euthanized because of a severe injury suffered in the fall.
