Charles Town set a record for total handle on its Charles Town Classic program last Saturday.
A total of $4,827,105 was wagered on the 13-race card, surpassing the $4,398,985 bet on Classic Day in 2013. More than half of the total was bet on the Charles Town Classic itself, which set a single-race track record for handle of $2,423,782.
Trainer Jamie Ness will have an increased presence at the upcoming Delaware Park meet.
Ness, the leading trainer at Delaware Park in 2012 and 2013, finished third in the standings last season behind Juan Vazquez and Scott Lake. Ness had between 25 and 30 horses at Delaware last year but is expected to have closer to 50 when the meet opens May 16.
Ness, 38, is currently based at Tampa Bay Downs, where through Tuesday he led the trainers’ standings with 41 wins, three more than second-place Gerald Bennett.
It appears that getting onto the Hall of Fame ballot was tougher for King Leatherbury than actually being voted into the Hall.
On Monday, the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame named Leatherbury one of this year’s four inductees. This was the first time the 82-year-old Leatherbury had been nominated.
Leatherbury will be the third-oldest living trainer inducted into the Hall of Fame, following Carl Hanford (89) and Sunny Jim Fitzsimmons (84), according to the National Museum of Racing.
John Velazquez will ride Carpe Diem and Javier Castellano will ride Materiality in the Kentucky Derby, trainer Todd Pletcher announced late Monday afternoon.
Velazquez has been riding both Carpe Diem and Materiality, both trained by Pletcher. They are considered among the top candidates for the May 2 Derby. Carpe Diem has won 4 of 5 starts, most recently the Blue Grass Stakes. Materiality is unbeaten in three starts, and comes off a victory in the Florida Derby.
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LOUISVILLE, Ky. – What figured to be a far-from-noteworthy Kentucky Derby-Oaks training session Monday got an unexpected boost when reigning female sprint champion Judy the Beauty worked six furlongs after the renovation break at 8:30 a.m. Judy the Beauty is scheduled to make her 2015 debut in the Grade 1 Humana Distaff here a week from Saturday.
Churchill Downs
Weather: Overcast
Temperature: 58
Track: Muddy, upgraded to good after the break
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer Joe Sharp plans to have 20 horses stabled at Belmont Park this spring and summer, and if they can perform the way Aztec Brave did in Sunday’s $100,000 Danger’s Hour Stakes at Aqueduct, he will have a successful meet.
Aztec Brave scored a front-running 1 1/4-length victory in the Danger’s Hour. He is the first horse Sharp has started on this circuit since he went out on his own last fall. Sharp has worked in New York before, serving three years as an assistant to Mike Maker.
OLDSMAR, Fla. – The trainers’ race at the 2014-15 Tampa Bay Downs meeting might go down to the final days, but there’s no question who will be the leading rider.
For the second straight year, Antonio Gallardo will top the jockeys’ standings, and the only question is whether he will win in record-setting fashion. Through Sunday, Gallardo had won 131 races, 13 shy of Daniel Centeno’s record of 144 victories set at the 2007-08 meeting. The meet ends June 30.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Judy the Beauty, the champion female sprinter of 2014, moved another step closer to her 2015 debut by working six furlongs in 1:12.70 at Churchill Downs over a “good” track on Monday.
Trainer Wesley Ward was not on hand for the drill but said his assistant for the last 25 years, Blake Heap, informed him that the work was “awesome,” and that Judy the Beauty is on target to launch her campaign in the Grade 1 Humana Distaff here May 2, Kentucky Derby Day.
Tonalist, last year’s Belmont Stakes and Jockey Club Gold Cup winner, will be returning to Belmont Park from Florida this weekend, trainer Christophe Clement said Monday, though where the multiple Grade 1 stakes winner will make his return to the races is still not decided.
Tonalist, unraced since running fifth in last year’s Breeders’ Cup Classic, worked six furlongs in 1:16 on Monday at Payson Park, Clement said. It is the second straight week that Tonalist worked six furlongs in 1:16.
Indiana Grand Racecourse commences its 2015 racing season Tuesday, with a new summer date for the Indiana Derby, an attractive and stable purse structure – and one nagging issue that won’t go away.
If the land on which Indiana Grand sits had a small mountain and the day were sufficiently clear, a person could spy several competing racing venues off in the distance. The region is flush with them.
