ELMONT, N.Y. – Three jockeys who ride regularly at Belmont Park will be serving suspensions of varying lengths this week.
Last Saturday, Manny Franco started a seven-day suspension for a careless riding infraction in regard to the first race on June 15. Franco, the 10th-leading rider at the Belmont meet with 20 wins, will be eligible to ride on Sunday. The suspension was reduced from 10 days for waiving his appeal.
ARCADIA, Calif. – McKinzie, a troubled second in the Grade 1 Metropolitan Stakes at Belmont Park on June 8, worked a half-mile in 51 seconds on Sunday at Santa Anita for a scheduled start in the Grade 1 Whitney Stakes at Saratoga on Aug. 3.
The $1 million Whitney Stakes is run at 1 1/8 miles. The winner receives a fees-paid berth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita on Nov. 2.
A five-person panel of veterinarians and stewards will continue a recently enacted policy of reviewing the medical, training and race records of all horses entered to race at the summer meetings at Los Alamitos and Del Mar in coming months.
Rick Arthur, California’s equine medical director, said on Sunday that the personnel for the Los Alamitos panel had yet to be finalized. A Del Mar official said on Saturday that the track will have a review panel, and said an announcement on details will be made this week.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Jerry Hollendorfer, the Hall of Fame trainer who was banned from training and racing his horses at tracks owned by the Stronach Group – including Santa Anita and Golden Gate where he was based – will be permitted to race and train at New York Racing Association tracks, the company said in a statement on Sunday.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Trainer Shug McGaughey feels Code of Honor has become the forgotten horse in the 3-year-old division.
Part of that is because since he finished third – elevated to second with the disqualification from first of Maximum Security – in the Kentucky Derby, Code of Honor has not run. But he is training, and on Sunday, he put in a solid five-furlong move in 1:00.33 over the Belmont main track.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Of the close to 400 horses to put in timed workouts over three tracks at Belmont Park on Sunday, few, if any, were more impressive than dual Grade 1 winner Catholic Boy, who blazed five furlongs in 58.82 seconds over the main track.
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas – Texas Belle can sweeten the outstanding meet trainer Mindy Willis is having at Lone Star Park on Sunday in the $50,000 Lane’s End Danny Shifflett Scholarship Stakes. The mare will start as one of the top choices in the turf route, one of four stakes on the inaugural Lone Star Showcase Day.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – The return of local favorite Galleon Mast, postponed when rain forced the Soldier’s Dancer Stakes to be taken off the turf two weeks earlier, will finally take place Sunday, weather permitting. Galleon Mast, a multiple stakes winner, faces nine others going a mile on turf in the best of three allowance events on a 12-race program at Gulfstream Park.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Desert Ride, who used an allowance victory on the Keeneland turf in April as a springboard to victory earlier this month in the Woodbine Oaks, had her final pre-race breeze for the Queen’s Plate when going five furlongs in 1:02.60 early Friday at Churchill.
