Editor’s Note: Countdown to the Crown returns for a seventh season online as one of the most comprehensive handicapper’s scouting reports of the 3-year-old scene. Posted each Friday at DRF.com from Jan. 6 through the Belmont Stakes, Countdown keeps you apprised of the rising stars of the 3-year-old class from the maiden ranks through the Grade 1 stakes. You can access daily updates and interactive features at Countdowntothecrown.com as well.
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1. The inaugural Santa Susana Stakes in 1935 was won by the 2-year-old filly Dunlin Lady. She was ridden by William “Smokey” Saunders, who later that year was aboard Omaha when that colt became the third winner of racing’s Triple Crown.
Dunlin Lady’s time on the three-furlong straightaway was 34 flat.
The Santa Anita Oaks, scheduled to be run for the 73rd time Saturday, is one of the original stakes from the inaugural 1934-35 meeting of the Arcadia, Calif., track.
For its first 50 years, the Oaks was known as the Santa Susana Stakes − and for seven years in the 1950s as the Santa Susana Handicap − after the mountain range directly to the west of the San Gabriel Mountains that form the famed backdrop for Santa Anita Park.
Trainer Bud Klokstad, 79, a member of the Washington Racing Hall of Fame, died early Wednesday at his home in Richmond, Calif. He had been ill for several months.
Klokstad raced at both Golden Gate Fields and Emerald Downs. He had been based at Golden Gate Fields since 2008 and sent out his final starter, Majestic Afleet, for a victory in Saturday’s eighth race.
WHO’S HOT
With their lucrative victories over the weekend, both Daddy Nose Best, who won the Sunland Derby, and Went the Day Well, who captured the Spiral Stakes, muscled their way onto the Derby Watch top 20 this week. Mike Watchmaker, Daily Racing Form’s national handicapper, has Daddy Nose Best at 25-1 on his Kentucky Derby future line, with Went the Day Well at 30-1.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The results of several key prep races in recent weeks have led to seven new names for the third and final pool of the 2012 Kentucky Derby Future Wager, which opens its three-day run Friday at noon Eastern and will be kept open long enough Sunday evening to accommodate the running of the Louisiana Derby.
Rep. Ed Whitfield, a Republican from Kentucky, called late on Tuesday for renewed support for legislation he introduced last year that would subject horse racing to federal regulation and ban the use of furosemide, a diuretic commonly known as Lasix, on race day.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Churchill Downs officials said Tuesday they intend to move back the customary closing time of the third and final pool of the 2012 Kentucky Derby Future Wager to accommodate the running of the Louisiana Derby.
Flashy Dresser, the runaway winner of the Rushaway Stakes at Turfway Park last Saturday, along with Tampa Bay Derby runner-up Golden Ticket, Sunland Derby runner-up Isn’t He Clever, and Swale Stakes winner Trinniberg, on Monday were announced among the 20 late nominations to the Triple Crown, which brings the total number of Triple Crown nominations this year to 418.
With their lucrative victories over the weekend, both Went the Day Well, who won the Spiral Stakes on Saturday at Turfway Park, and Daddy Nose Best, who captured the Sunland Derby on Sunday, gleaned enough graded stakes earnings to practically assure themselves starting spots in the May 5 Kentucky Derby.
But whether either runs again before the Derby is not certain just yet.