SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Sunset Ridge kept her record perfect and turned a few heads in winning a second-level New York-bred allowance by 16 3/4 lengths here Wednesday. Sent off at 1-5, she received a career-best 99 Beyer Speed Figure.
:: Just reduced! Save on Clocker Reports for Del Mar and Saratoga
DEL MAR, Calif. – Peter Miller has been the most active trainer in the first three weeks of Del Mar’s summer season, with 69 starters through Wednesday, the 16th day of the 36-day meeting.
Miller had 10 starters on the July 19 opening-day program. He is unlikely to have that many during the current five-day racing week, which goes through Sunday.
Expressing concern about the condition of the track and how his horses have performed, Miller said Wednesday he plans to cut back his number of runners.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Lockdown, the third-place finisher in the Kentucky Oaks, worked a sharp five furlongs in 1:00.21 on Tuesday over the Oklahoma training track in preparation for the Grade 1 Alabama here on Aug. 19.
Lockdown went in company with Length, who was credited with a half-mile in 47.47 seconds. The two were head and head for most of the drill, with Lockdown going out an extra eighth of a mile.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Sagamore Farm and trainer Horacio DePaz have won five 2-year-old races from 10 starters this year, including the Tremont Stakes at Belmont Park with He Hate Me. This weekend, they will look for more success with runners in Saturday’s Adirondack and Sunday’s Saratoga Special – Grade 2, $200,000 stakes for juvenile females and juveniles, respectively.
In the Adirondack, Sagamore and DePaz will send out Proportionality and Southampton Way in the eight-horse field.
Colonelsdarktemper, the winner of last Saturday’s West Virginia Derby at Mountaineer, came out of the race in good condition and could make his next start in the Grade 3, $400,000 Oklahoma Derby at Remington Park on Sept. 24, trainer Jinks Fires said.
Fires said he is also considering other races, including the Grade 1, $1 million Pennsylvania Derby on Sept. 23, but his suspicion is that the latter race will prove a far more demanding spot.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Time Test was sent from Europe to the U.S. by Juddmonte Farms with the hope that he would have a campaign similar to Flintshire’s in 2016. It has not quite worked out that way.
After two runner-up finishes in graded stakes at distances of 1 1/8 miles and 1 1/4 miles, Time Test will shorten up to a mile in Saturday’s Grade 1, $500,000 Fourstardave Handicap at Saratoga.
The signature race of the Ellis Park meeting, the Grade 3, $100,000 Groupie Doll Stakes, takes place Sunday, with a field of eight or more expected to be entered when the race is drawn Thursday. Contested at a mile on the main track, the race is shaping up to be competitive.
Two probable starters trained by Brad Cox, Tiger Moth and Pinch Hit, will garner mutuel support, as should Walkabout, a graded stakes winner at Churchill Downs this spring, and Put Da Blame On Me, a winner of two straight one-mile allowance races at Churchill.
Elite grass sprinter Lady Aurelia, the winner of the Group 1 King’s Stand at Royal Ascot on June 20, is ready for another British invasion after working an effortless five furlongs in 1:02 on the Keeneland turf Tuesday as she prepares for the Group 1 Nunthorpe Stakes at York on Aug. 25.
Trainer Wesley Ward, reached by telephone Tuesday in New York, where he was attending the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga selected yearling sale, was thrilled with her breeze, in which she outworked Grade 1-winning older horse Hootenanny under a hammerlock from jockey Julio Garcia.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – Permian began his 2017 campaign by finishing third in a Class 2 handicap at Bath in England. That is a long way from being the 2-1 morning-line second choice Saturday in the Grade 1 Secretariat Stakes.
“He was definitely above average as a 2-year-old, but I think we’d all be quick to admit going into this season we didn’t expect him to reach the heights he has,” said Charlie Johnston, assistant to his father, trainer Mark Johnston.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – During a very successful training career that began in 2013, Arnaud Delacour has sent out close to 1,050 starters. But Hawksmoor, who runs in the Grade 1 Beverly D. on Saturday, will be his first at Arlington.
Hawksmoor is part of a deep, very competitive 10-horse field in the 1 3/16-mile Beverly D. From the rail out, the entrants are Dacita, Prado’s Sweet Ride, Kitten’s Roar, Dona Bruja, Grand Jete, Zipessa, Rainha Da Bateria, Sarandia, Hawksmoor, and Rain Goddess.
