Cassatt is entered in the Jersey Lilly Stakes on Saturday at Sam Houston, marking the first attempt on turf for the graded stakes-winning earner of more than $700,000. On paper, the daughter of leading sire Tapit is well suited to the move.
Cassatt’s dam, Justenufftime, is out of the turf stakes winner Justenuffheart, a half-sister to turf champion and leading sire Kitten’s Joy as well as multiple Grade 1 winner Precious Kitten. It is also the family of Grade 1 winner Down the Aisle.
On a stakes-loaded Saturday card at Fair Grounds, with major events on both the main track and the turf, there was one dominant sire, as Candy Ride sired a pair of stakes winners: Gun Runner, who took a step forward on the Kentucky Derby trail by winning the Grade 2 Risen Star Stakes, and Chocolate Ride, who posted a repeat victory in the Grade 3 Fair Grounds Handicap. Candy Ride, a Ride the Rails horse standing at Lane’s End Farm in Versailles, Ky., just missed getting a third stakes winner on the card, as his Eagle finished second in the Grade 3 Mineshaft.
Congrats has become known as a solid sire of fillies and lived up to that billing again on Saturday. The A.P. Indy stallion, who stands at WinStar Farm in Versailles, Ky., was represented by three stakes winners on the day – longshot Venus Valentine in the Grade 2 Rachel Alexandra at Fair Grounds, the unbeaten Cash Back in the Melody of Colors at Gulfstream, and the stalwart Haveyougoneaway in the Spring Fever at Oaklawn.
ARCADIA, Calif. – When Alert Bay earned $47,500 for a second-place finish in the $251,000 California Cup Turf Classic at Santa Anita on Jan. 30, he became the 62nd California-bred to surpass $1 million in career earnings.
That’s a big crowd, one led by 2014 Horse of the Year California Chrome, with earnings of $6,442,650. Alert Bay has banked $1,028,235, which is just fine with trainer Blaine Wright.
“For a guy like me, it means a lot,” Wright said last weekend. “I haven’t had a horse that made half that much.”
Never underestimate the value of a good eye. Without a keen batting eye, it’s nearly impossible to be a successful hitter in the major leagues. It takes a different type of eye to be successful in the breeding industry, but a good eye is just as crucial when buying mares or yearlings at auction.
Former Tampa Bay Rays outfielder Rocco Baldelli is now the team’s first base coach, but lately he also has relied on his good eye to help him buy mares at auction, breed them to stallions, and sell the foals.
Law Enforcement, an 11-year old son of Posse who stood the last three seasons at stud in Minnesota, returned to the work tab Tuesday at Fonner Park, breezing a bullet three furlongs in 37.20 seconds.
It was such an unexpected sight for the Fonner Park clocker that the track’s racing office called trainer Troy Bethke to make sure they had the right horse.
“They said, ‘The only one we could find was an 11-year-old stallion.’ ” Bethke recalled. “I said, ‘No, that’s him.’ ”
Edited press release
Grayson-Jockey Club Research Foundation’s longstanding Share the Wins program got off to a quick start for 2016 with John Oxley, Heaven Trees, and Speedway Stables becoming the first three owners to pledge earnings from potential graded stakes wins on the Kentucky Derby trail to equine research. Each owner has pledged to donate 1 percent of net purses (minus entry fees and trainer and jockey fees) for graded stakes up to and including the Kentucky Derby to Grayson-Jockey Club Research Foundation.
Oratory, one of the leading stallions in Oklahoma, was euthanized after an accident following a recent surgery, according to a joint release from his ownership and the farm at which he stood, River Oaks in Sulphur, Okla. He was 14. He was eighth on the general sire list in Oklahoma in 2015.
Oratory, who stood as the property of Mike Grossman’s Eureka Thoroughbred Farm of Texas, had surgery for a nerve issue. He was a son of Pulpit out of Arrested Dreams, by Dehere. From six crops to race, Oratory has sired four stakes winners and progeny earnings of $7.89 million.
Alpha Bettor, Canada’s champion older male of 2013, has been retired from racing and will join the relocating Mast Track at Daehling Ranch in Elk Grove, Calif. for the 2016 breeding season.
Alpha Bettor, an 8-year-old son of Alphabet Soup, finished his career with 12 wins in 40 starts over seven seasons of racing and earnings of $838,275. He raced the bulk of his career in Canada, winning the Grade 2 Eclipse Stakes and Autumn Stakes and the Grade 3 Seagram Cup Stakes during his championship season. He also won the Seagram Cup in 2012.
Vicar, a Grade 1 winner and prominent sire in Korea, died in that country on Jan. 24.
The 20-year-old son of Wild Again stood at the Korean Racing Authority’s Jeju Stud Farm in the southwest corner of the country. His listed cause of death was a throat obstruction, as reported by the Racing in Korea website.
Bred in Kentucky by John Meriwether and Richard Leahy, Vicar won four of 17 career starts during his career for earnings of $835,142.
