LEXINGTON, Ky. – With the connections of so many 3-year-olds with plenty of eligibility points clamoring to make the field for the May 6 Kentucky Derby, the Grade 3, $200,000 Lexington Stakes on Saturday will not produce a Derby starter.
The 1 1/16-mile Lexington is worth 17 points, including 10 to the winner, but none of the projected starters will have enough points to make the Derby. Probables include Convict Pike, No Dozing, Resiliency, Tiz a Slam, and West Coast.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The last two Grade 1 races of the 15-day spring meet will be run this week on the turf course, with the $300,000 Maker’s 46 Mile set for Friday and the $350,000 Jenny Wiley anchoring a slate of four Saturday stakes.
Lady Eli, the star turf mare trained by Chad Brown, will make her 5-year-old debut in the 1 1/16-mile Jenny Wiley, which shapes up as perhaps the best race of the meet. Other probable starters include Catch a Glimpse, Time and Motion, and Dickinson.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Nobody likes to lose, but Buff Bradley couldn’t be blamed for leaving Keeneland on Sunday with a good feeling, even after his stable star, Divisidero, lost by a nose to Projected in a turf allowance.
“This kind of effort was exactly what we were looking for,” said Bradley, who trains Divisidero for the Gunpowder Farms of Tom Keithley.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – The Grade 1, $1 million Arkansas Derby lost a major player in One Liner on Monday, while travel plans were set for another top contender in champion Classic Empire. The race, which carries 170 Kentucky Derby eligibility points, will be run Saturday.
One Liner, the undefeated winner of the Grade 3 Southwest Stakes, will not start in the Arkansas Derby and is off the Kentucky Derby trail, trainer Todd Pletcher said.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Not a whole lot was settled by the surprising results of the Blue Grass Stakes on Saturday at Keeneland: The top five finishers in the field of seven all have enough qualifying points and appear likely to run back May 6 in the Kentucky Derby.
OLDSMAR, Fla. – No Dozing, the runner-up in the Grade 2 Remsen Stakes last fall, is being rerouted to the Grade 3, $200,000 Lexington Stakes at Keeneland on Saturday after posting a bullet workout at Tampa Bay Downs over the weekend.
No Dozing, most recently fourth in the Grade 2 Tampa Bay Derby on March 11, worked five furlongs in 1:01 last Saturday, the fastest of 17 works at the distance here that day. Trainer Arnaud Delacour had said following the Tampa Bay Derby that No Dozing was likely to await the $125,000 Federico Tesio Stakes at Laurel Park on April 22.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Trainer Mick Ruis went nearly 10 years between winners.
Ruis, 57, won an optional claimer at 6 1/2 furlongs last Saturday at Santa Anita with Rockport Babe ($38.60), his 15th starter at the meeting and his first winner since 2007.
“That feels good,” he said Sunday.
Later Sunday, Ruis won his first stakes as a trainer when the Grade 1 winner Union Strike won her first start of the year in the $79,290 Santa Paula Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at 6 1/2 furlongs.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Sircat Sally has outgrown the California-bred division.
Unbeaten in five starts, Sircat Sally won her graded-stakes debut in the Grade 3 Providencia Stakes on turf at Santa Anita last Saturday. Trainer Jerry Hollendorfer said he is considering the Grade 3 Senorita Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at a mile on turf May 6 for Sircat Sally’s next start. The $100,000 Senorita could lead to an appearance in the Grade 2 Honeymoon Stakes at 1 1/8 miles on turf for 3-year-old fillies June 17.
“She’s doing well on turf,” Hollendorfer said.
ARCADIA, Calif. - As 2017 unfolds, trainer Richard Baltas’s female turf division is growing in strength.
Goodyearforroses won the Grade 2 Santa Ana Stakes on March 12 and is scheduled to start in next Saturday’s Grade 1 Jenny Wiley Stakes at a mile on turf at Keeneland. Place des Vosges, the winner of optional claimers in February and March, may run in the Grade 3 Santa Barbara Stakes at 1 1/2 miles on turf at Santa Anita on April 30.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Paradise Woods, who won the Grade 1 Santa Anita Oaks by 11 3/4 lengths Saturday, had a believer in trainer Richard Mandella long before her first start in January.
“I don’t want to sound like I’m bragging, but she’s always made us think she was that good,” he said.
That may sound easy for Mandella to say after such an impressive win in the $400,690 Santa Anita Oaks, except the Hall of Fame trainer insists he had those thoughts before Paradise Woods finished a well-beaten second in her debut Jan. 26.
