Willard C. “Mike” Freeman, trainer of Hall of Famer Shuvee, died Wednesday at a nursing home in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., after long illness, according to the manager of the South Carolina farm he owned with his wife. Freeman was 84.
“He was a great man, salt of the earth,” Bernadette Clayton said. “He was very, very dear to me.”
Keith Desormeaux is happy, albeit guardedly so. It is the first Tuesday in March, and he is driving west on Interstate 10 toward his hometown of Maurice, La., where a home-cooked meal and an overnight stay at his parents’ house await.
Desormeaux enjoys these occasional visits, which typically come only when he is in the general vicinity, some three hours away while tending to his 20-horse stable at Fair Grounds in New Orleans.
Penn National Gaming Inc., the owner of 22 casinos and nine racetracks across the United States, said Thursday in a release accompanying financial statements that it will not go ahead with plans to relocate Beulah Park, which is in Columbus, Ohio, if the state’s racing commission holds the company to a demand to increase the size of the track’s grandstand.
In 1948, Citation won the Derby Trial on April 27, the Kentucky Derby on May 1, the Preakness on May 15, and – since running in all three legs of the Triple Crown wasn’t quite enough work – the Jersey Derby on May 29 before the Belmont Stakes. He won all five of those races, part of a 19-for-20 campaign that year.
Govenor Charlie, the Sunland Derby winner and an intended starter in the Kentucky Derby on May 4, was sent to Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital in Lexington, Ky., after arriving in Kentucky from California.
"We had a hind foot issue a couple days ago, so I want to make sure we didn't miss anything," trainer Bob Baffert said Wednesday.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Uncaptured’s Kentucky Derby dreams came to an end after he disappointed in last Saturday’s Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland.
But Uncaptured and his connections figure to be front and center here Friday evening at the 38th annual Sovereign Awards gala honoring Canada’s outstanding performers of 2012.
Uncaptured, 6 for 7 with four stakes victories including the Grade 2 Kentucky Jockey Club and Grade 3 Iroquois at Churchill Downs, is a finalist for honors as Canada’s champion 2-year-old male and also is a candidate to be named Canada’s Horse of the Year.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The licensing review committee of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission voted Tuesday to approve a license application for Rudy Rodriguez, trainer of the Kentucky Derby hopeful Vyjack, but under a requirement that Vyjack be monitored by video surveillance while at Churchill Downs.
The Ohio State Racing Commission on Tuesday tabled a vote on whether to approve an agreement to run River Downs’ traditional live racing dates at Beulah Park, citing the lack of a deal between Beulah and horsemen, according to the executive director of the state’s horsemen’s group.
Rosie Napravnik became the first female rider to win the Kentucky Oaks last year on Believe You Can, and she will get a chance to become the first female rider to win the Kentucky Derby on May 4 after being named Tuesday to ride Mylute, who finished second most recently in the Louisiana Derby under Shaun Bridgmohan.
