Bonne Chance Farm is the nom de course of owner-breeders Gilberto Sayão da Silva and Paulo Fernando de Oliveira, who send out the 4-year-old filly Nom de Plume as one of the favorites in the featured fifth race Sunday at Churchill Downs.
While Cherie DeVaux trained More Than Looks to win the Breeders’ Cup Mile last weekend at Del Mar, she’s not done seeking Grade 1 turf prizes in 2024.
She Feels Pretty, smashing winner of the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup on Oct. 12 at Keeneland, will likely travel to California for the Grade 1 American Oaks on Dec. 26 at Santa Anita.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - May Day Ready, the multiple stakes-winning 2-year-old filly and runner-up in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf at Del Mar, will make her next start in the Grade 1 Hanshin Juvenile Fillies at Kiyoto in Japan on Dec. 8, trainer Joe Lee confirmed Thursday morning.
The Hanshin Juvenile has a purse of 140,200,000 yen, which translates to $915,758 in U.S. dollars.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Far Bridge, the two-time Grade 1 winner who finished ninth in the Breeders’ Cup Turf, and Big Invasion, the multiple stakes winner who finished 10th in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint, will both race again in 2025, trainer Christophe Clement said.
Far Bridge won the Sword Dancer and Joe Hirsch Turf Classic in 2024 before finishing 5 3/4 lengths behind Rebel’s Romance in the BC Turf.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Law Professor has done his best work at Aqueduct and though most of his success has come in races run around two turns, he is targeting the Grade 2, $500,000 Cigar Mile, a race run around one turn, on Dec. 7 as his next start.
Saturday is comeback day for a pair of Steve Asmussen-trained 3-year-olds.
Track Phantom, last seen finishing 11th in the Kentucky Derby, and Hall of Fame, most recently 10th in the Louisiana Derby, start in separate allowance races at Churchill Downs.
Track Phantom has accomplished far more than his stablemate, winning the Gun Runner and the Lecomte last winter at Fair Grounds. Accordingly, he returns in a salty higher-level allowance over seven furlongs.
Moira sold for $4.3 million on Monday night at the Fasig-Tipton November sale, two days after winning the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf at Del Mar, certainly a popular victory on both sides of the border.
The 2022 Canadian Horse of the Year, Moira became the seventh Canadian-bred to win a Breeders’ Cup race and the first since Wavell Avenue in 2015. Her victory also is the third by a Queen’s/King’s Plate winner, joining Dance Smartly (1991, Distaff) and Awesome Again (1998, Classic) as the only horses to have won at both events.
The New York Racing Association realized significant gains in all-sources and average daily handle at the Belmont at the Big A fall meet that concluded Sunday.
All-sources handle at the 30-day meet was $262,241,829, a 36.4 percent increase over the $192,200,723 handled over 26 days of racing at the corresponding meet in 2023, according to figures provided by NYRA. Average daily handle was $8,741,394, an 18.2 percent increase over the $7,392,335 handled in 2023.
Ontrack handle was $22,887,403, a 33.1 percent increase over the $17,189,736 figure in 2023.
