MIAMI – Any thoughts that Curlin’s Approval might have been over the top following her 13th-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint were alleviated in less than 57 seconds Monday morning at Gulfstream Park. That’s how long it took the Grade 2 winner to work an eye-catching five furlongs under jockey Luis Saez over a muddy track.
Santa Anita, whose winter meeting opens Dec. 26, announced it will institute an incentive program to bring horses to California and keep them here.
Called Ship & Stay, the program mirrors Del Mar’s popular Ship and Win program, which pays a bonus for horses who come from out of state for races other than stakes.
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DEL MAR, Calif. – Mubtaahij will get quite a bit of class relief Saturday when he runs in the Grade 3, $100,000 Native Diver just three weeks after finishing eighth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic. He worked a half-mile in 49.80 seconds Tuesday at Santa Anita.
The Native Diver, at 1 1/8 miles, is the lone stakes on dirt of the eight stakes run the final week of the meet at Del Mar.
DEL MAR, Calif. – It looks like sprints will be the focal point in the future for the 2-year-old filly Dream Tree, who remained unbeaten with a narrow victory in the Desi Arnaz Stakes on Saturday at Del Mar.
Bob Baffert, who trains Dream Tree, said the daughter of Uncle Mo had come out of the race well, but that the Grade 1 Test Stakes next summer at Saratoga is the kind of race he will point her to as a 3-year-old.
Gun Runner’s win in the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic on Nov. 4 was not the final stakes win that day for trainer Steve Asmussen.
Direct Dial came through later in the evening in a $65,000 division of the Texas Stallion Stakes at Retama Park, winning his first stakes and possibly putting himself in position to run in the $400,000 Springboard Mile on Dec. 17 at Remington Park.
Jockey David Cohen is nearing a return to race riding and plans to winter at the Oaklawn Park meet, which opens in January, he said Monday.
Cohen, 33, last rode Aug. 11, 2014, at Gulfstream. He has been working horses at Churchill Downs and intends to have his first mounts back at Fair Grounds before heading to Oaklawn.
Trainer Doug O’Neill will have a startup stable of sorts at the Oaklawn Park meet, which opens in January.
O’Neill said Little Rock, Ark.-based businessman Mark Schlesinger and partners will stable some horses with him at Oaklawn. O’Neill said he will not relocate horses from his existing stable in Southern California.
“We’re starting our own little string at Oaklawn and giving it a test,” O’Neill said Tuesday.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer David Jacobson said Monday that he plans to send 20 horses to Santa Anita for the winter-spring meet, which begins Dec. 26, and hopes to have a year-round presence in Southern California.
Jacobson said his contingent will mostly be made up of turf horses, though he will have some dirt runners as well. Jacobson, a major player in the claiming game, had a Southern California string during the 2015-16 season and won four races from 55 starters.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Catholic Boy, fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf, will most likely make his dirt debut in the Grade 2, $250,000 Remsen Stakes on Dec. 2 at Aqueduct, trainer Jonathan Thomas said Monday.
Catholic Boy was shipped from Southern California to New York in the days after the Breeders’ Cup. Last Friday, Catholic Boy worked a half-mile in 49.66 seconds over the Belmont Park training track in company with the Todd Pletcher-trained debut winner Stratosphere.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Party Boat’s only victory in her 3-year-old season came in a listed stakes over Aqueduct’s turf course in April. Her connections hope she can end her season with a repeat performance when Party Boat returns to New York for Thursday’s second running of the $150,000 Winter Memories Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at Aqueduct.
As one of the last opportunities for 3-year-old fillies to race within their own age group on turf this year, the Winter Memories drew a field of 11 for the grass plus three in the unlikely event the race is transferred to the dirt.
