SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Finley’sluckycharm was beaten a neck by Paulassilverlining in last year’s Grade 2 Honorable Miss Handicap, and she is back at Saratoga for another try at that six-furlong stakes for fillies and mares.
On Wednesday, Finley’sluckycharm breezed a half-mile in 50.07 seconds over an Oklahoma training track rated “good.” Finley’sluckycharm will be trying to bounce back from a fourth-place finish in the Grade 1 Humana Distaff at Churchill Downs when she starts next Wednesday.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainers Todd Pletcher, Mark Casse, and Steve Asmussen each entered two horses in Saturday’s Grade 3, $150,000 Sanford Stakes, the first of three graded dirt stakes for 2-year-olds at the meet.
Pletcher, a six-time Sanford winner, entered debut winners Lexitonian and Sombeyay, who drew the rail and post 2. Asmussen entered first-out winners Whiskey Echo (post 4) and Bano Solo (post 7), while Casse is going with Dream Maker (post 5) and Strike Silver (post 8), who won their debuts at Churchill Downs a week apart.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Proctor’s Ledge will have at least one thing in her favor when she takes on trainer Chad Brown’s arsenal of three Grade 1 winners in Saturday’s $500,000 Diana Stakes, the first Grade 1 race at Saratoga this year.
She loves the course.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – In 2015, there was American Pharoah. The following year, Songbird. Last year, the individual winners of all three Triple Crown races ran in the Travers for the first time in 35 years and the 4-year-old Gun Runner came out of upstate New York a legitimate Horse of the Year contender.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Tom Amoss certainly doesn’t relish the thought of going up against both Monomoy Girl and Midnight Bisou with his Grade 2-winning filly Chocolate Martini again Sunday in the Grade 1 Coaching Club American Oaks. But such is life in the fast lane when spending the summer at Saratoga.
Chocolate Martini finished fifth, beaten 10 1/4 lengths by Monomoy Girl, in the Kentucky Oaks. Midnight Bisou finished third that day before returning to dominate the Grade 2 Mother Goose last month at Belmont Park.
DEL MAR Calif. – Collected and West Coast, second and third in the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Del Mar last November, are rejoining trainer Bob Baffert’s stable for autumn campaigns after being rested in Kentucky.
West Coast, the champion 3-year-old male of 2017, arrived at Baffert’s barn at Los Alamitos last week. Collected, unraced since finishing seventh in the $16 million Pegasus World Cup at Gulfstream Park in January, is set to arrive at Del Mar next week, Baffert said.
Baffert said Collected has more of a foundation of recent training.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Abel Tasman, impressive winner of the Ogden Phipps in her last start on June 9 at Belmont Park, worked six furlongs in 1:12 on Wednesday morning at Del Mar for a start either here or at Saratoga.
Her trainer, Bob Baffert, said he was not sure quite yet where Abel Tasman would make her next start. Options include the Grade 1 Clement Hirsch here on July 29, which also is the intended next start for fellow Eclipse Award winner Unique Bella, or waiting until the Grade 1 Personal Ensign at Saratoga on Aug. 25.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – In a span of nine days last summer, the horses who would go on to be voted champion 2-year-old male and champion 2-year-old female debuted at Saratoga.
Good Magic lost his debut. Caledonia Road won hers.
Perhaps racing’s next juvenile champions will emerge from here again this summer when the Saratoga meet opens Friday for its 40-day run. Led by horses from the barns of Todd Pletcher, Chad Brown, and Steve Asmussen, some of the most expensive and well-bred babies in the world could run at the Spa this summer.
Larry Jones is finished. Not with training Thoroughbreds, but riding them every morning.
“I’ll still get on one on occasion,” Jones said this week from his barn at Keeneland in Lexington, Ky. “But yep, I finally decided that I’m done.”
At age 61, weighing 185 pounds, Jones long has been known for doing what other trainers his age and weight have rarely done – exercise his own horses. This literal hands-on approach has distinguished Jones from his peers, but no more.
Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark., will boast two $1 million preps for the Kentucky Derby in 2019 as part of a number of flashy changes to its stakes schedule for a meet that will extend beyond Arkansas Derby Day to May 4. The season starts Jan. 25.
Oaklawn will offer 30 stakes worth a record $8.8 million during its 57-date meet. The centerpiece remains the Grade 1, $1 million Arkansas Derby on April 13.
