Big Macher was a stakes winner at Del Mar's fall meet one year ago, and he is expected to defend his title, on Sunday, in the $100,000 Cary Grant Stakes for California-bred sprinters going six furlongs.
Big Macher won the Pirate’s Bounty, under similar conditions, on closing day of the summer meeting Sept. 7 in his first start since finishing fifth in the Dubai Golden Shaheen at Meydan. In his lone start since the Pirate’s Bounty, he was 10th in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Keeneland on Oct. 31.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Instead of going on a honeymoon the day after getting married, jockey Joe Talamo is going to work.
Talamo and Elizabeth Ellis, daughter of trainer Ron Ellis, are getting married on Friday night in San Diego. On Saturday, Talamo will head right back to work at Del Mar aboard Three Hearts, who will defend her title in the Grade 3, $100,000 Red Carpet Stakes for older fillies and mares at 1 3/8 miles on turf.
The Washington Horse Racing Commission on Friday approved a 70-day racing season for 2016 at Emerald Downs. The meet will run from April 9-Sept. 11.
Racing will be conducted on Saturdays and Sundays for the first two weekends, with Friday night racing added to the schedule beginning April 22. There also will be racing on the Mondays of Memorial Day and Labor Day as well as on Monday, June 20, when Emerald will celebrate its 20th anniversary with a night card.
California Chrome recorded his first published work, but his second work since going back into training, with an easy three furlongs in 39.60 seconds early Saturday morning at Los Alamitos.
California Chrome worked two furlongs the previous Saturday, but that is a distance too short to make the official work tab. This work did make the tab, according to Russell Hudak, the head clocker at Los Alamitos, who timed California Chrome beginning at the quarter pole.
The eighth race Friday night at Delta Downs was declared a no-contest after the starting gate wasn’t pulled from the track before the horses hit the stretch in the two-turn optional claimer. There was a malfunction with the gate, the track announced, but crews were able to move it into the infield just as the horses were approaching it.
Trainers Tom Amoss and Patrick Byrne are among the new faces on board for the Oaklawn Park meet that opens Jan. 16.
Amoss, who also will have a winter division at Fair Grounds, said it has been a number of years since he had a string based at Oaklawn. Byrne will stable at the track for the first time. He said he last raced at Oaklawn in 2003. He sent out Eugene’s Third Son to a runner-up finish in that year’s Arkansas Derby.
Oaklawn is projecting purses will average a record $475,000 a program.
Jockey Patrick Valenzuela’s first mounts in more than a year and a half are on the immediate horizon in Louisiana, among them Memories of Winter in the Grade 3, $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot on Nov. 21.
Valenzuela, 53, plans to ride the Fair Grounds meet that opens next Thursday, said his agent, Rob Whitlock. But the earliest Valenzuela is expected to be in the saddle in New Orleans is Sunday, Nov. 22. Whitlock said a race for which Valenzuela was booked for Friday, Nov. 20, did not go, but Valenzuela will ride the Jackpot on a special afternoon card at Delta next Saturday.
The New York Racing Association will hold 49 stakes worth $7.48 million during the 2016 Aqueduct winter and spring meets, which run from Jan. 1 through April 24. The schedule is quite similar to last year, but a number of small adjustments have been made by Martin Panza, NYRA’s senior vice president of racing operations.
Last year, 47 stakes were held during the same period for purses of $7.06 million.
“We tweaked it a little,” Panza said. “We added a little money and a few more stakes. It’s a serviceable schedule; there’s something there for every division.”
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The new future wager that will be offered during the final week of the meet (Nov. 26-29) is proving a fun project for Darren Rogers, the Churchill Downs media relations director. Rogers is primarily responsible for choosing the 23 sires to be listed as separate wagering entities for the 2016 Kentucky Derby Sires Future Wager, which is modeled closely after the future wager Churchill has offered annually since 1999.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The only horse to defeat American Pharoah this year is a possible starter in the annual fall showcase at Churchill Downs, the Nov. 27 Clark Handicap, although whether or not Keen Ice runs in the Grade 1 race depends entirely on what transpires with the colt’s breeding rights.
Jerry Crawford, who heads the Donegal Racing partnership that owns Keen Ice, said Friday that negotiations are ongoing with various entities interested in acquiring the 3-year-old colt, which leaves his status for the Clark uncertain.
