LEXINGTON, Ky. – Few people are going to be watching the results of the Arkansas Derby more closely than Nick Zito.
The Hall of Fame trainer is dead set on getting Frammento into the lineup for the 141st Kentucky Derby on May 2 but will need a little help in the points standings for that to happen.
“The bottom line is he’s a mile-and-a-quarter horse,” Zito said. “That’s what he’s going to be best at.”
For a champion with 10 wins in 11 starts, Shared Belief has had to do a lot of convincing on his journey to the top of the Thoroughbred rankings in North America.
At first, he was regarded as a synthetic-track horse. Then he missed the 2014 Triple Crown with a foot injury, losing the opportunity to face the best of his division.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Trainer Alexander Patykewich finished the 2014 Woodbine season with just one horse in his barn but now returns from the Gulfstream Park meet with three after a productive winter from stable star Skylander Girl.
Skylander Girl made three starts at Gulfstream during the winter, highlighted by a runner-up effort to Singapore Cup winner Parranda in the Grade 3 Marshua’s River Stakes on Jan. 10. Skylander Girl is now at Woodbine preparing for the Grade 3 Whimsical Stakes here April 18.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Grade 3 Selene Stakes winner Paladin Bay is back in training at Woodbine after missing the second half of the 2014 season with bone bruising.
Trainer Harold Ladouceur said the injury occurred after Paladin Bay ran third in the Bison City Stakes on July 13 and that she might have been able to return before the end of the year.
“We could have probably tried after six weeks off, but it was so late in the season, and I didn’t want to ship her anywhere, so we decided to take the rest of the year off,” he said.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Sheer Drama, the runaway winner of the Grade 2 Royal Delta Stakes here March 21, turned in the work of the morning at Gulfstream Park on Friday. The homebred daughter of Burning Roma cruised through a half-mile in 48.57 seconds, completing her final quarter in 23.97 while finishing in hand and into a stiff headwind. She galloped out five furlongs in 1:01.54 and pulled up six panels in 1:15.72.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Patrick Husbands and Luis Contreras had quite the battle atop the Woodbine jockey standings toward the end of last season, but they might have some company this season as former New York jockey Alan Garcia joins the Woodbine colony this year.
Garcia, a winner of 1,449 career races, recently has been riding on the Kentucky circuit while also spending the summers at Saratoga. Garcia said he’s fully committed to Woodbine for the duration of the 2015 season.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – D. Wayne Lukas made an impression on a teenage Bob Baffert decades ago when Lukas shipped several horses into a Sonoita, Ariz., track about 30 miles from Baffert’s home. Lukas was an established Quarter Horse trainer and was invading for trials for a futurity.
“It was big time,” recalled Baffert. “He rolled in with all these good 2-year-olds, a first-class operation. He was the guy. Wayne’s always been bigger than life. He’s always been the bar of racing.”
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Tamarkuz, the nose winner of the Grade 2 Godolphin Mile on Dubai World Cup Night at Meydan, will soon ship to trainer Kiaran McLaughlin’s New York barn and be pointed to the Grade 1 Metropolitan Handicap on Belmont Stakes Day.
Tamarkuz, owned by Sheikh Hamdan’s Shadwell Stable, is a Kentucky-bred son of Speightstown. Tamarkuz’s dam, Without You Babe, is a half-sister to Stay Thirsty, who in 2011 won the Cigar Mile at Aqueduct and the Travers and Jim Dandy stakes at Saratoga.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Joint Return, the runner-up in the Grade 1 Alabama Stakes last year, will kick off her 4-year-old campaign in Saturday’s Grade 3, $200,000 Top Flight Handicap at Aqueduct.
A field of nine fillies and mares was entered for the Top Flight, scheduled for 1 1/8 miles on the dirt.
House Rules, the runner-up as the 4-5 favorite in the Grade 2 Royal Delta Stakes last out, likely will go off favored in the Top Flight.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – New York Racing Association officials have postponed two turf stakes scheduled to be run this weekend at Aqueduct until next week, it was announced Wednesday.
The $100,000 Danger’s Hour, for older horses at one mile, was originally scheduled for Wood Memorial Day but, due to poor weather, was postponed with the hopes of running it this weekend. Now, the race will be rescheduled for April 18.
