NFL star Travis Kelce has entered minority Thoroughbred ownership via the Team Valor International partnership, that outfit announced Tuesday.
Team Valor said in a release on Aug. 27 that the Zoldan family and Kelce have acquired a “significant share” of Team Valor’s own interest in the 3-year-old gelding Swift Delivery, who the partnership co-owns with Gary Barber. Team Valor said Swift Delivery will be entered in this Saturday’s $125,000 Toronto Cup on the Woodbine turf.
Trainer Kenny McPeek and the connections of his horses will be honored this year with the Mr. Fitz Award for “typifying the spirit of racing,” the administrators of the award, the National Turf Writers and Broadcasters, announced Tuesday.
Law-enforcement officers in Henderson, Ky., are investigating the overnight discovery of two men found dead in the dormitories on the backstretch of Ellis Park, the sheriff’s office said on Tuesday morning.
Officers were called to the track early Tuesday morning to respond to an “unconscious subject” on the backstretch who was later found dead “in his apartment on the backside of Ellis Park.” When directed to a person the dead person had been seen with earlier in the night, they found another man “deceased in his apartment.”
A man who was found on the backstretch of Mahoning Valley Racecourse in Youngstown, Ohio, with three banned substances in his possession has been suspended six years by the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit, according to a ruling posted on the HIWU website.
The man, who was identified as Gabriel Hilardo Rivera, was observed hiding a “black tackle box” behind the tire of a vehicle on Mahoning Valley’s backstretch by HIWU investigators on March 27. The tackle box contained “various injectable medications, needles, and syringes,” the investigators said in a report.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Though Domestic Product has twice this year finished ahead of Fierceness in two-turn stakes races, he has found his best game going shorter distances.
About 45 minutes before Fierceness won Saturday’s Grade 1, $1.25 million Travers at 1 1/4 miles at Saratoga, Domestic Product won the Grade 1 H. Allen Jerkens going seven furlongs, beating Prince of Monaco by a neck. Domestic Product, trained by Chad Brown, followed a similar path set by his sire Practical Joke seven years earlier.
DEL MAR, Calif. - There was a time in the final months of 2023 when Raging Torrent was tried twice in top two-turn races for juveniles in California and Oklahoma. He finished fourth in the Grade 1 American Pharoah Stakes at Santa Anita and last of six in the Springboard Mile at Remington Park.
“He acted like two turns would be what he wanted to do,” trainer Doug O’Neill reflected on Sunday morning. “I was wrong.”
DEL MAR, Calif. - The six-time stakes winner Planetario has been retired, less than a week before an intended start in the Grade 2 Del Mar Handicap on Saturday.
Trainer Richard Mandella said Planetario was recently diagnosed with a suspensory injury. The injury was detected after a seven-furlong workout at Del Mar on Aug. 19.
“He’s got a slight tear in a suspensory ligament,” Mandella said on Sunday. “It’s a dangerous place to have that.”
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Fierceness, Sierra Leone and Dornoch, the first-, third- and fourth-place finishers from Saturday’s Grade 1 Travers Stakes at Saratoga, all will be trained toward the $7 million Breeders’ Cup Classic on Nov. 2 at Del Mar, a race that will likely be the deciding factor in determining the 3-year-old male champion of 2024.
Free Like a Girl became the all-time leading Louisiana-bred earner on Friday night with her win in the Misty Bennett Pink Ribbon Stakes at Charles Town.
The first-place check of $294,000 lifted Free Like a Girl's career earnings to $1,916,978. She is a 5-year-old mare by El Deal and was a $5,500 purchase at auction in 2020.
“There’s no words, really,” said Chasey Deville-Pomier, who co-owns and trains Free Like a Girl. “We’re just so proud of her. That’s all I can say, really.”
Handle on the 14-race card at Saratoga Race Course on Saturday shattered the previous record for Travers Day, with a 13.3 percent increase over the 2022 record set for a 13-race lineup, according to figures distributed by the New York Racing Association.
Total handle for the card was $63.0 million, up $7.4 million over the $55.6 million record set in 2022, according to the figures. Average handle per race for Saturday’s card was $4.5 million, compared to $4.2 million for the 13-race card in 2022, a difference of 7.1 percent.
