ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Peggy O has quickly blown through her Ontario-sired conditions in four starts this year and will step up to stakes company for the first time in the $150,000 Jammed Lovely Stakes on Nov. 7 at Woodbine, trainer Catherine Day Phillips said. The seven-furlong sprint on Polytrack is for Ontario-bred 3-year-old fillies.
“That’s a logical spot for her,” she said. “She had two races quite close together, so this gives her a little more time to get organized for the Jammed Lovely.”
When apprentice jockey David Lopez fractured his back in a spill at Golden Gate Fields on June 6, he expected to be riding again in six weeks. But complications kept him sidelined for 4 1/2 months.
When he returned to riding when Golden Gate Fields opened last Thursday, Lopez was hoping to get one victory. Instead, he won with his first two mounts and ended the day with three winners from four mounts. Three of the winners were saddled by Billy Morey, who made four trips to the winner’s circle that day.
And Lopez hasn’t slowed down.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Lukes Alley, the 2014 Canadian champion older male, will try to win the Grade 2, $200,000 Autumn Stakes for the second year in a row Nov. 8, trainer Josie Carroll said.
The lightly raced 5-year-old won his first start of the season by 2 3/4 lengths on Sept. 12 in a 1 1/16-mile allowance race on Polytrack, earning a 93 Beyer Speed Figure. He tried to repeat in the Grade 3 Durham Cup Stakes on Oct. 3 but couldn’t hold off Golden Sabre in deep stretch.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Om is in position to become the first horse to sweep the three late-summer and autumn turf derbies in Southern California when he makes his next start Nov. 28 in the $300,000 Hollywood Derby at Del Mar.
Om won the Grade 2 Del Mar Derby on Sept. 6 and the Grade 2 Twilight Derby at Santa Anita on Saturday. The Grade 1 Hollywood Derby is run at 1 1/8 miles on turf, the same distance and surface as the other two races.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Last May, Dortmund was on a losing streak and exhausted. A win in the Santa Anita Derby in April was followed by a third in the Kentucky Derby and a fourth-place finish in the Preakness Stakes.
“He looked like he was overcooked,” trainer Bob Baffert said Sunday.
Dortmund was rested through the summer and returned to racing with a win Saturday in the minor Big Bear Stakes at Santa Anita. The race was a prep for the $500,000 Clark Handicap at Churchill Downs on Nov. 27.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Masochistic had his final workout at Santa Anita on Sunday in advance of the Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Keeneland next Saturday. The two-time stakes winner worked five furlongs in 58.40 seconds without company, the fastest of 50 recorded works at the distance.
“He looked like he did it easily,” trainer Ron Ellis said. “He was relaxed.”
With the final workout completed, Ellis has another prerace objective to achieve: He is banking on an outside post position for Masochistic in the BC Sprint. Post positions will be drawn on Monday.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Breeders' Cup Juvenile hopeful Tale of S’avall missed a workout scheduled for Sunday due to some tenderness in his frogs – the bottom part of the foot that acts like a shock absorber – trainer Barclay Tagg said Sunday morning.
Tagg said he still plans to take the horse to Keeneland on Monday with the idea of running in the Juvenile.
"His frogs are a little tender, but he's dead fit," Tagg said. "His last work was very good. Personally, I don't think [missing] this work will make a bit of difference to him."
ELMONT, N.Y. – Though Honor Code is coming off a lackluster third-place finish in the Grade 2 Kelso earlier this month, trainer Shug McGaughey said his confidence level is “pretty high” entering next Saturday’s $5 million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Keeneland.
“That could have helped him, maybe pushed him forward,” McGaughey said Sunday morning at Belmont Park. “I think that his last three weeks have been the best three weeks I’ve seen him have.”
ELMONT, N.Y. – La Verdad, who won Saturday’s $150,000 Iroquois Stakes at Belmont Park, is expected to ship Monday to Kentucky and run Saturday in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint at Keeneland, trainer Linda Rice said.
“After rating yesterday, I think we should go,” Rice said Sunday morning in her Belmont Park office. “The fact she’s headed to the breeding shed after this, what are we saving her for? What have we got to lose?”
