OZONE PARK, N.Y. – White Abarrio, the 2023 Breeders’ Cup Classic winner who was recently transferred back to trainer Saffie Joseph Jr., will not run in next Saturday’s Grade 2, $200,000 John Nerud Stakes at Aqueduct as originally intended.
Joseph, who was given the horse back the day after White Abarrio finished fifth in the Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap on June 8 at Saratoga, said he wants to give the horse additional time before he runs again.
Mario Gutierrez, who has won two Kentucky Derbys, is switching agents.
Beginning with the Del Mar summer meeting that starts on July 20, Gutierrez will be represented by Mike Ciani. Earlier this week, Gutierrez parted with Matt Nakatani, a decision that Nakatani said was made in a mutual agreement.
“We’re going to go our separate ways,” Nakatani said.
Nakatani will continue to represent Umberto Rispoli.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Though there are plenty of stakes options for 3-year-olds in the coming weeks, trainer Todd Pletcher is focused on the biggest prize – the Grade 1, $1 million Haskell Invitational on July 20 at Monmouth Park – for his trio of Mindfame, Fierceness, and Tuscan Sky.
After putting all three through workouts Friday morning in Saratoga, Pletcher sees no reason to alter those plans three weeks out from that race.
The champion mare Idiomatic will make her next start July 20 at Monmouth Park in the Grade 3, $500,000 Molly Pitcher Stakes.
Idiomatic returned to trainer Brad Cox’s Churchill Downs string after her agonizing second-place finish June 8 in the Ogden Phipps at Saratoga and is scheduled to have her first timed workout since that race either Thursday or Friday, Cox said.
Missed the Cut, a two-time graded stakes winner at Santa Anita earlier this year, but last of nine in the Group 2 Hardwicke Stakes at Royal Ascot in Britain on Saturday, was flown to California earlier this week.
Trainer John Sadler said on Wednesday that Missed the Cut could return to racing at the Del Mar summer meeting, with the Grade 2 Del Mar Handicap at 1 3/8 miles on Aug. 31 a possibility.
Sadler said on Wednesday that Missed the Cut was in quarantine at a local facility and scheduled to be moved to his Santa Anita stable on Friday.
Saturday’s $100,000 Los Alamitos Derby has drawn a field of five, including the stakes winners Tapalo and Wynstock and the stakes-placed Cornell.
Kamaina Cruiser, a maiden race winner at Golden Gate Fields in his last start on June 1, will have his stakes debut in the Los Alamitos Derby, run at 1 1/8 miles.
The race will be the fourth stakes appearance for Curlin’s Kaos, who was fourth in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby in April and seventh by 1 1/2 lengths as the 2-1 favorite in the Snow Chief Stakes for statebreds at 1 1/8 miles on turf at Santa Anita on May 25.
Jockey Tyler Baze will be sidelined until the start of the Del Mar meeting on July 20 after sustaining a broken bone in a hand in a post parade at Los Alamitos on Saturday, he said on Wednesday.
Baze saw a specialist on Monday and said he was informed he will not need surgery. He said he has been fitted with a soft cast that protects the two small finger of a hand and covers his wrist.
Baze said he hopes to receive doctor’s approval in a few weeks to resume full activity. The injury has not prevented him from doing gym workouts, he said.
Lone Star Park leading jockey Harry Hernandez will return to riding Wednesday after receiving a doctor’s clearance, agent Cody Autrey said. Hernandez had been sidelined with a collapsed lung and four cracked ribs in a spill June 14. At the time, it was expected he would miss the remainder of the meet, which ends July 14.
However, Hernandez said on Monday he was not having any significant or traditional pain associated with injured ribs and wanted to move up his next doctor’s appointment that was for early July. He received clearance to ride on Tuesday.
Jockey Cindy Murphy had retired from race riding late last year, but the promising group of 2-year-olds in training by her husband, Travis Murphy, led to her return to the saddle earlier this month at Prairie Meadows.
Cindy Murphy said her husband has a 26-horse stable racing at Prairie Meadows, with about a dozen of those runners 2-year-olds. They are by such sires as Audible, Brody’s Cause, Constitution, Instagrand, Mo Town, and Thousand Words. Maverama, a colt by Cairo Prince, runs in the fourth on Friday.
The Southern California-based jockey Umberto Rispoli will begin a stretch of travel on Friday night, when he arrives in Texas to ride three stakes on Saturday’s card at Lone Star Park.
The track is putting on its annual Texas Turf Festival, and there are a total of four stakes worth $625,000. Rispoli rides What Say Thee in the $250,000 Texas Turf Classic, Stir Crazy in the $125,000 Wasted Tears, and Itzel in the $125,000 Chicken Fried Stakes.
