Turning into the stretch at the Palm Meadows training center Friday morning, Enticed was about a length behind his stablemate First Commander, a maiden, in what was to be Enticed’s final workout before the Grade 2 Wood Memorial on April 7 at Aqueduct.
Trainer Kiaran McLaughlin, watching from the clocker’s stand, said of Enticed, “He’s likely to be second.”
Indeed, Enticed was only able to get within a neck of First Commander at the end of the half-mile work. Enticed was timed in 49.91 seconds.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Caledonia Road, who has not started since her resounding victory in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies on Nov. 4, will have her much-anticipated 3-year-old debut delayed again due to a virus she contracted earlier this month.
Old Time Revival tuned up for the April 7 Wood Memorial at Aqueduct by working five furlongs at Laurel Park over a “good” track in a bullet 58.60 seconds Wednesday.
Maryland Jockey Club head clocker Kevin Geraghty timed Old Time Revival for a half-mile in 46.80, with a gallop-out of 1:11.40.
Jockey Victor Carrasco, sidelined with a badly broken right leg since a Sept. 14 spill at Delaware Park, was informed by his doctors Tuesday his bones have healed well enough for him to begin galloping horses in the next few weeks.
Carrasco, a leading rider in Maryland and the Eclipse Award-winning apprentice of 2013, has undergone extensive physical rehabilitation the past few months and is eager to resume his career.
The promising 3-year-old Diamond King was scratched from the Private Terms Stakes with a fever March 17, but he never became very ill and quickly resumed training. He worked a mile for trainer John Servis in 1:47.60 at Parx Racing on March 24.
“The work was excellent, he’s doing very good,” Servis said. “His fever got up to about 102, but he fought it off. We never did treat him for it.”
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Luis Saez continued his dominance of the Gulfstream Park Championship meet, winning seven races from eight mounts on Thursday’s 11-race card, equaling a single-day record for the South Florida track.
His only loss came by a neck.
It was the second time this meet Saez won seven races on a card, having done so on Jan. 24 when he went 7 for 9. Jerry Bailey in 1996 established the record and Tyler Gaffalione equaled it last July.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Violent Ridge, who was second in the California Cup Derby for statebreds on Feb. 19, sustained a cut on a foreleg in a recent workout and will not start in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby on April 7, trainer Hector Palma said on Thursday.
The injury required sutures to close the wound and will cost Violent Ridge three weeks of training, Palma said.
Violent Ridge, owned by BG Stables, won an allowance race for California-breds at a mile on March 11.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Paradise Woods, a two-time Grade 1 winner, emerged from her fourth in the Grade 2 Santa Monica Stakes at Santa Anita last Saturday with a sore foot, trainer Richard Mandella said.
Mandella said Paradise Woods will be pointed for the Grade 1 Beholder Mile for fillies and mares on June 2, with a possible start in the Grade 3 Adoration Stakes at 1 1/16 miles on May 6.
ARCADIA, Calif. – The stakes schedule for the Del Mar summer meeting, July 18 to Sept. 3, comprises 41 races with minimal changes from the 2017 season. The distances and conditions of four 2-year-old stakes are among the most prominent differences.
Two Grade 2 stakes for 2-year-olds – the Best Pal for both sexes and the Sorrento for fillies – have been shortened from 6 1/2 furlongs to six furlongs. The races are worth $200,000 each and lead to two Grade 1 races at seven furlongs on Labor Day weekend – the Del Mar Futurity and the Del Mar Debutante.
Enhanced security protocols will be in place for the Grade 2 Wood Memorial on April 7 at Aqueduct, according to a press release issued by the New York Gaming Commission and the New York Racing Association on Thursday.
According to the release, the protocols were triggered by a purse increase to $1 million from $750,000 because a Grade 1 winner is participating in the race. Firenze Fire, winner of last year’s Grade 1 Champagne at Belmont, is scheduled to run in the Wood.
