Wed, 10/04/2017 - 14:46

Giant Expectations's Breeders' Cup plans are fluid

Benoit & Associates
Giant Expectations may race in the Santa Anita Sprint Championship on Oct. 7.

ARCADIA, Calif. – By late Saturday afternoon, the 4-year-old colt Giant Expectations could have a new race goal for the Breeders’ Cup.

Giant Expectations starts in Saturday’s Grade 1 Santa Anita Sprint Championship, and although he is using the race as a prep for the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, trainer Peter Eurton said he would consider switching him to the Sprint if he were to win.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 14:26

Sire Stakes winners Soutache, Starship Bonita to take it easy

Lauren King/Coglianese Photos
Soutache has three wins in four starts as a 2-year-old.

MIAMI – Hopefully everybody got a good look at Florida Sire Series winners Soutache and Starship Bonita on Saturday, because it’s not likely either will be seen again for a while.

Trainer Ralph Nicks said Soutache has already been sent home to GoldMark Farm, where he’ll be given plenty of time off following his victory in the $400,000 In Reality Stakes.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 14:20

Navarro agrees not to enter horses at Delaware meet

Jorge Navarro, the trainer who has been dogged by controversy for the past several years, has agreed not to enter any horses at Delaware Park for the remainder of the track’s meet this year, the state racing commission’s top official said Wednesday.

John Wayne, the administrator for racing for the Delaware State Racing Commission, said Navarro agreed to the proposal during a sit-down interview at the commission’s offices Wednesday morning.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 13:56

Breeders' Cup Classic: Keen Ice keeps dancing every dance

Barbara D. Livingston
Keen Ice had lost 10 consecutive starts since August 2015.

For more than three years now, Keen Ice has plied his trade across the country and in Dubai, his 23 starts taking place at 11 different tracks. And while he’s only won three of those starts, there are only a few from his crop still racing at the highest level in the sport.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 12:16

Sanchez sustains concussion in spill

Jim McCue/Maryland Jockey Club
Mychel Sanchez wins the 2016 Nellie Morse Stakes with Love Came to Town.

Mychel Sanchez was not seriously injured in a Monday spill at Parx Racing and could resume riding as soon as this weekend, according to his agent, retired rider Josiah Hampshire Jr.

Sanchez was thrown hard to the turf when his mount, Shake Things Up, appeared to break down entering the first turn of the 1 1/16-mile race. With Sanchez momentarily knocked out and lying in the center of the course, the outriders directed the riders of the remaining eight entrants to pull up their mounts in the stretch. The stewards declared the race a no-contest.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 12:06

Retired champ Main Sequence back at Fair Hill

Tom Keyser
Main Sequence capped a 4-for-4 campaign by winning the Breeders' Cup Turf on Nov. 1.

Main Sequence, the retired champion male turf horse of 2014, is back at the Fair Hill Training Center, where he spent his racing days with trainer Graham Motion.

According to a newsletter put out by Herringswell Stables, Main Sequence has been moved into the stall and paddock previously occupied by Better Talk Now, who was euthanized in June at age 18 due to complications following colic surgery.

Main Sequence will share his paddock with the 29-year-old Gala Spinaway, who in August 1993 won the Grade 3 Polynesian at Pimlico, giving Motion his first graded win.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 12:06

El Areeb working toward winter return

Michael Amuroso
The 3-year-old El Areeb wins his fourth straight race, this time by 4 1/4 lengths under Trevor McCarthy, in the Withers.

Graded stakes winner El Areeb, who has missed the bulk of his 3-year-old season with a knee injury, has returned to the Laurel Park work tab for trainer Cal Lynch and is being prepared for a winter campaign.

El Areeb breezed three furlongs in 37.80 seconds Sept. 23 and then picked up the tempo last Saturday with a bullet three furlongs in 36.00.

“We gave him an easy three furlongs two weeks ago and then last week let him work a little,” Lynch said. “He probably went a little faster than we’d like, but he did it well.”

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 11:26

Breeders' Cup Sprint: Whitmore looks to punch ticket in Phoenix

Michael Amoruso
Whitmore has never lost in seven starts going one turn, including the Maryland Sprint Stakes at Pimlico three weeks ago.

Early this year, Whitmore was the talk of the sprint division, opening his campaign with four consecutive victories, including a pair of Grade 3 wins, that vaulted him into the upper echelon of the division.

But things have not gone quite as well during the second half of the year. Whitmore has started just twice since defeating A. P. Indian in the Grade 3 Maryland Sprint on May 20, finishing third in both the Grade 2 True North at Belmont and the Grade 3 De Francis Memorial Dash last month at Laurel.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 11:00

Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies: Lady Ivanka among elite Oklahoma-breds

Barbara D. Livingston
The Oklahoma-bred Lady Ivanka (left) wins the Grade 1 Spinaway at Saratoga.

There were 525 Thoroughbred foals born in Oklahoma in 2015, representing just 2.5 percent of the registered foal crop in the United States. But a good horse can come from anywhere, as Oklahoma-bred millionaires Lady’s Secret, Kip Deville, and Clever Trevor have already proved.

And among those 525 Thoroughbreds born in the Sooner State two years ago was Lady Ivanka, who will go for the second Grade 1 win of her nascent career in Sunday’s Frizette Stakes at Belmont Park.

Wed, 10/04/2017 - 10:30

Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Sprint: Unique Bella can consolidate favoritism in L.A. Woman

Emily Shields
Unique Bella hasn't raced since winning the Santa Ysabel in March at Santa Anita.

All eyes will be on Unique Bella when the top prospect for the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint makes her eagerly awaited return to action Sunday in the Grade 3 L.A. Woman at Santa Anita.