LEXINGTON, Ky. – Multiple graded winners Restless Rider and Royal Charlotte are among the 3-year-old fillies being pointed to the Grade 2, $250,000 Raven Run, the highlight of a quartet of stakes races next week at Keeneland.
Restless Rider, unraced since the Kentucky Oaks, and Royal Charlotte, whose connections have chosen to bypass the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint, will head a field of at least eight in the seven-furlong Raven Run, to be run for the 21st time next Saturday.
MIAMI – Trainer Amador Sanchez and jockey Hector Berrios came to the U.S. from their native Chile to try to make a name for themselves in this country. They will have accomplished that in relatively short time if they can pull off the upset with the undefeated Graceful Kitten in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf at Santa Anita on Nov. 1.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Fear No Evil is winless in six starts this year and has dropped 10 in a row since her last victory in June 2018, which should only serve to help her price in a very competitive renewal of the $100,000 Floral Park Stakes at Belmont Park.
Fear No Evil, at 7-1, finished second in this race last year and she was coming off a good race in the Sensible Lady Turf Dash at Laurel Park. Saturday, she is coming off a ninth-place finish in the Sensible Lady with a bit of a troubled trip.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Todd Pletcher figures to have five horses for this year’s Breeders Cup, topped by Jockey Club Gold Cup first-place finisher Vino Rosso, who is targeting the $6 million Classic.
Vino Rosso finished a nose in front of Code of Honor in the Jockey Club Gold Cup, but was disqualified to second for bumping him in the final furlong.
Other BC horses for Pletcher are Sweet Melania (Juvenile Fillies Turf), Freewheeler (Juvenile Turf Sprint), Coal Front (Dirt Mile), and Channel Cat (Turf).
ARCADIA, Calif. – El Tigre Terrible, the surprise winner of the Speakeasy Stakes for 2-year-olds at five furlongs on turf on Sunday, is scheduled to start in the $200,000 Golden State Juvenile for statebreds at seven furlongs on dirt at Santa Anita on Nov. 1.
El Tigre Terrible earned an automatic berth in the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint with the win at 23-1 in the Speakeasy Stakes, but would have to be nominated to the Breeders’ Cup program at a cost of $100,000 by Oct. 21, the day pre-entries are due.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Jockey Martin Pedroza is taking a hiatus from race riding.
Pedroza has not ridden since Oct. 3. He took off his mounts on Oct. 4 and the rest of last weekend. Pedroza spoke with the Santa Anita stewards at the time, saying he needed a vacation.
“He told me he wanted to take a break for 30 days,” steward Kim Sawyer said on Thursday.
Richie Silverstein, Pedroza’s longtime agent, declined to comment when reached on Wednesday.
Pedroza told Sawyer that he might travel to his native Panama to visit family.
ARCADIA, Calif. – McKinzie and Mitole shared the racetrack for workouts at Santa Anita early Thursday morning. They may share the winner’s circle here a few hours apart on Nov. 2.
McKinzie and Mitole are leading contenders for Breeders’ Cup races and had separate tune-up workouts at a half-mile on Thursday. They worked just after dawn.
McKinzie, bound for the $6 million BC Classic at 1 1/4 miles, worked a half-mile in 49.40 seconds, his first workout since his second as the favorite to longshot Mongolian Groom in the Grade 1 Awesome Again Stakes here on Sept. 28.
The Grade 1, $1 million Shadwell Turf Mile on Saturday at Keeneland was the Breeders’ Cup Challenge Win and You’re In race linked to the Breeders’ Cup Mile, and all credit to Bowies Hero for a convincing, professional victory there that punched his Breeders’ Cup ticket.
Love, the 2-year-old filly trained by Aidan O’Brien, earned a berth in the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf on Nov. 1 at Santa Anita by winning the Group 1 Moyglare Stud Stakes in Ireland on Sept. 15.
If she is sent to California, Love will have had a tough autumn campaign. Friday at Newmarket Racecourse in England, Love is part of a strong field of nine in the Group 1 Fillies’ Mile that includes three undefeated runners – Cayenne Pepper, Quadrilateral, and Powerful Breeze.
Unlike the other Breeders’ Cup races contested on turf, Europeans have made little noise in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint, with every edition of the race since it was added to the program in 2008 captured by a U.S.-based runner. That may continue to be the case this year, as the top runners from various international jurisdictions aren’t likely to make the trip to California.
