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?”
The Keeneland fall meet technically wrapped Saturday, though the Lexington, Ky., track will host its first Breeders’ Cup next week. For statistical purposes, the track officially concluded a 17-day meet with a final day of racing that capped slight declines in handle and attendance, according to initial figures.
KEENELAND
Track: Fast
Weather: Raining
Temp: 62
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The clear skies that prevailed throughout the past week gave way to rain on Saturday morning at Keeneland, the change in weather having a major impact on the training schedules of a handful of prospective Breeders’ Cup starters, including Distaff contenders STOPCHARGINGMARIA and I’M A CHATTERBOX along with likely Sprint favorite PRIVATE ZONE.
ARCADIA, Calif. – The standout 2-year-old in California this year has been Songbird, the unbeaten winner of Grade 1 races for fillies at Del Mar and Santa Anita in September.
While the California-based colt Nyquist is unbeaten in four starts, including three stakes wins, one of his rivals, Swipe, at least finished within three-quarters of a length of him in the Grade 1 FrontRunner Stakes on Sept. 26.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Tonalist, the two-time Jockey Club Gold Cup winner, and 10 horses from trainer Chad Brown’s stable led a flurry of Breeders’ Cup workers Saturday morning at Belmont Park.
A total of 15 horses with designs on getting into a Breeders’ Cup race had published workouts on one of three surfaces at Belmont on a cool, partly sunny fall morning.
Tonalist, preparing for the $5 million Breeders’ Cup Classic, led off the morning, working five furlongs in 1:00.41 before galloping out six furlongs in 1:14.17 and pulling up seven-eighths in 1:29.36.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Friday proved to be the busiest morning yet at Keeneland for Breeders’ Cup workers, with a logjam after the renovation break caused in part by a forecast that calls for possible showers beginning around mid-morning Saturday and continuing over the next couple days.
California Chrome has settled into a routine of light exercise since his arrival from a Kentucky farm earlier this month.
Trainer Art Sherman said on Thursday that California Chrome has been jogged a mile each day. The exercise will increase to two miles this weekend. California Chrome is based with Sherman’s stable at Los Alamitos.
Sherman said California Chrome was overly eager when he resumed training, but that the 4-year-old has shown more patience in recent days.
“I noticed this morning that he’s a little better,” Sherman said on Thursday. “He’s settled down.”
Sunday is the final day of the Santa Anita autumn meeting, and when Del Mar is taking entries for Thursday’s opening day of its autumn meeting. The Del Mar meeting will operate on a four-day per week schedule, from Thursday through Sunday, until it ends on Nov. 29.
The opening week of Del Mar includes simulcasts of Breeders’ Cup races from Keeneland on Friday and Saturday. The track plans to conduct nine-race programs on those days, running live events between Breeders’ Cup races.
Though his connections listed the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf on Friday as his first preference, Isotherm will be entered Monday for Saturday’s $2 million Juvenile on the dirt, trainer George Weaver said Friday.
Isotherm is 2 for 2 on turf, including a victory Sept. 26 in the Grade 3 Pilgrim Stakes at Belmont Park. He finished fourth in his only dirt start, a six-furlong race at Saratoga.
