ELMONT, N.Y. – Pat On the Back, winner of the $300,000 Empire Classic on Saturday’s Empire Showcase Day program, could make his next start in the Grade 1, $750,000 Cigar Mile on Dec. 1 at Aqueduct, trainer Jeremiah Englehart said.
“We always wanted to try him in open company in a one-turn mile,” Englehart said Sunday, the day after Pat On the Back beat Can You Diggit by 1 1/2 lengths in the Empire Classic, a one-turn, 1 1/8-mile race.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Monday was pretty much a carbon copy of the previous morning weather-wise, clear and cold, with the temperature a crisp 36 when the track opened for training at 5:30 a.m. and frost warnings up for the region until 9 a.m.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Back-to-back allowances will be the highlights Thursday at Keeneland as the days continue to dwindle at the 17-day meet. First post for a nine-race card is 1:05 p.m. Eastern.
Race 8, a $73,000, third-level sprint, serves as the nominal feature. Mines and Magic, beaten a nose for this same condition last month at Churchill, is among a handful of viable contenders in a field of 11 fillies and mares, along with Nineteenth Street, Annathela, and Thirteen Songs.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Miguel Mena will make his long-awaited return to the saddle when riding Wildwood Dancer in the first race Thursday at Keeneland.
Mena, who will turn 32 on Nov. 6, suffered fractures of his right ankle and heel in a March 15 race spill at Fair Grounds, where he had been leading rider at the time. He has undergone an arduous rehabilitation process and has been exercising horses at Churchill for several weeks.
Mena intends to ride sparingly over the next couple of weeks before leaving early for Fair Grounds, which starts Nov. 15.
Maximus Mischief recorded the highest Beyer Speed Figure by a 2-year-old this year on Saturday at Parx Racing when he won a first-level allowance race by six lengths. The victory came three weeks after he scored an easy 8 3/4-length victory in his debut.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Hofburg concluded his major preparations for his next start in the Fayette Stakes when breezing five furlongs in 1:00.60 on Monday over a fast track at Churchill Downs.
Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott said Sunday at Keeneland that he intended to enter Hofburg in the Fayette, provided the Monday work went well. With that, Hofburg figures to come a solid favorite Saturday in what was expected to be a medium-sized field of 3-year-olds and up when entries were taken Wednesday for the Grade 2, $200,000 Fayette, the closing-day feature of the Keeneland fall meet.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Anna Meah, who launched a stable in late summer, will have her first starter at Santa Anita on Thursday when Sekhmet’s Revenge runs in a $20,000 claimer for fillies and mares at a mile on turf.
The filly is part of Meah’s family. Her husband, David, a bloodstock agent and exercise rider in Southern California, owns Sekhmet’s Revenge with William Marasa.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert plans to have as many as 10 runners in Breeders’ Cup races on Nov. 2-3 at Churchill Downs, he said Sunday.
Baffert will have three runners in the BC Classic on Nov. 3 – Collected and West Coast, who were second and third in the 2017 running at Del Mar, and the 3-year-old McKinzie, who won the Grade 1 Pennsylvania Derby on Sept. 22.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Dixie Moon capped her 2018 season on a high note with a half-length victory over Avie’s Mineshaft in Saturday’s $125,000 Carotene Stakes on Woodbine’s turf course.
Trainer Catherine Day Phillips said Dixie Moon would spend the next couple of weeks on the farm before determining whether to resume her training ahead of a potential winter campaign.
“We’ll give here a little break now, and she’ll be ready to go again by January,” she said. “We’ll just let her tell us if she wants a little more time or a little less time.”
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Mac Robertson had a minor quibble with the Keeneland stewards the morning after Beach Flower was disqualified Sunday from first to third in the Grade 3 Dowager Stakes, but he has enough experience in racing not to throw a tantrum.
“I thought I had the best horse in the race, and I’m really proud of my filly,” said Robertson, who has won 1,223 races from 5,339 starters and is the all-time leading trainer in Canterbury Park history. “I thought her number probably should’ve stayed up, but nobody likes a crybaby.”
