Jockey Flavien Prat is hoping to resume riding Dec. 26, opening day of the Santa Anita winter-spring meeting, more than three months after injuring his back in a two-horse spill at Los Alamitos.
On Wednesday, Prat said he had started physical therapy in the last week. After the Sept. 17 riding accident, in which he fractured five vertebrae, Prat was told by doctors he would need three months’ rest before beginning therapy and likely wouldn’t be able to ride until late winter.
Trainer Larry Jones, unlike many outfits that spent the early autumn in Kentucky, already has shipped his entire string to Fair Grounds to prepare for the meet.
“Once we got out of Keeneland after the Breeders’ Cup, we took it all down here,” Jones said. “We’ve got 44 stabled here as of this morning.”
The fields for Zia Park’s most prestigious races were drawn Tuesday, with Breeders’ Cup Distaff starter Calamity Kate headlining the $300,000 Zia Park Oaks and International Star set to make his first start since March in the $200,000 Zia Park Derby. The races will be part of a program of eight stakes this coming Wednesday.
Roger Brueggemann’s experience at Fair Grounds doesn’t exactly qualify as extensive.
“One time, I went down there with a friend of mine to pick up a horse. We drove in and drove out, basically,” said Brueggemann.
But Brueggemann is about to get much more closely acquainted with Fair Grounds, where he will stable an entire barn full of horses this winter, nearly all of them for the Midwest Thoroughbreds Inc. of Richard and Karen Papiese.
Harry Rosenblum hit the jackpot last weekend with Gentlemen’s Bet in the $350,000 Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash at Laurel Park. The owner hopes to hit another one Saturday with recent acquisition Whitmore in the Grade 3, $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot.
Rosenblum and Robert LaPenta bought into Whitmore last week and will now race the Churchill Downs maiden winner with Southern Springs Stable. The horse’s trainer, Ron Moquett, is a co-owner of Southern Springs, and he also trains Gentlemen’s Bet as well as Far Right, owned by Rosenblum and LaPenta.
MIAMI – The Gulfstream Park championship meet does not begin until Dec. 5, but the influx of Northern-based horsemen to south Florida is well underway. Saturday’s pair of Grade 3 handicaps at Gulfstream Park West, the My Charmer and Tropical Turf, perfectly illustrates that point.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Toews On Ice, who scored his third straight stakes win in the Grade 3 Bob Hope last Saturday, likely will get a chance to stretch out in the Grade 1 Los Alamitos Futurity for 2-year-olds on Dec. 19, trainer Bob Baffert said Wednesday.
Toews On Ice has raced five times, all in sprints. After losing his first two starts, he has won three straight.
“If he looks good, I’ll run him back in the Futurity,” Baffert said. “Might as well find out if he can go long for $350,000.”
The Maryland Racing Commission on Tuesday approved 164 racing days in the state for 2016 and the stakes schedule for the Laurel Park winter meet.
With the exception of a break from Feb. 16 to March 10, racing will be conducted year-round. There will be 129 days of racing at Laurel Park, a 28-day meet at Pimlico Race Course, and seven days of racing at Timonium.
The winter break at Laurel meshes well with the schedule at Parx Racing in Pennsylvania. Parx will be closed Dec. 23 through Feb. 13, when Laurel will be running. Parx will then reopen when Laurel takes its break.
The Penn National Gaming tracks of Penn National, Mahoning Valley Race Course, and Zia Park will run 11 stakes worth more than $1.6 million during Thanksgiving week.
On Monday, Mahoning Valley Race Course will hold the $200,000 Steel Valley Sprint, a six-furlong race for 3-year-olds. The card also will include the $75,000 Hollywood Gaming Mahoning Distaff.
The Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash was run last weekend at Laurel Park with a $350,000 purse for the fourth straight year but still is waiting to be recognized by the American Graded Stakes Committee. Surely, it will make the grade next year.
