Seventeen 2-year-old fillies have been nominated for Saturday’s Juan Gonzalez Memorial Stakes at the Oak Tree at Pleasanton meet, while 16 2-year-olds, including four of the fillies, have been nominated for the Everett Nevin Stakes on Sunday’s closing-day card.
Nine of the fillies and 10 of the Nevin nominees are coming off wins, although none of the nominees in either race has placed in a stakes.
Racing secretary Tom Doutrich is pleased with the way the meet has been going.
A hometown hero will try to win Friday’s Oak Tree Sprint at the Oak Tree at Pleasanton meeting.
“He’s back in town,” trainer Reina Gonzalez said of Coach Bob.
Coach Bob, a 5-year-old Bertrando horse out of the unraced Gentleman’s Hope, was a $5,000 yearling purchase at the 2010 Northern California sale at the Alameda County Fairgrounds.
“We’ve had him in Pleasanton since he was a yearling,” Gonzalez said of the solid sprinter, whose career-high Beyer Speed Figure was a 102 at Golden Gate Fields in 2013.
As of Monday morning, Delaware Park stakes coordinator Lenny Rera had six probables for Saturday’s Grade 2, $300,000 Delaware Oaks. The race will be drawn Wednesday, along with three undercard stakes, and the field could change markedly between now and then.
The 1 1/16-mile Oaks heads the second most important day of the Delaware Park meet. The undercard stakes are the Grade 3, $200,000 Robert G. Dick Memorial for fillies and mares at 1 3/8 miles on the turf; and two $50,000 stakes, the Carl Hanford Memorial and the Oh Say.
The next two weekends are the highlight of the Delaware Park season. This Saturday is the Grade 2, $300,000 Delaware Oaks and July 12 is the Grade 1, $750,000 Delaware Handicap. The Delaware Handicap is expected to attract Princess of Sylmar, one of the leading older females in training.
The Delaware Oaks dates back to 1938. In recent years, the 1 1/16-mile race has established itself as an important prep for the 1 1/4-mile Alabama Stakes at Saratoga.
Between 2003 and 2010, four Delaware Oaks winners went on to win the Alabama.
Next Sunday is one of the biggest days of the Monmouth Park meeting, with both the Grade 1, $500,000 United Nations and Grade 3, $150,000 Salvator Mile on tap.
While the fields were still coming together as of Monday, here is a look at some of the possible starters, according to Monmouth Park stakes coordinator Dan Dufford:
United Nations, 1 3/8 mile on turf
ARCADIA, Calif. – Santa Anita ended its spring-summer meeting on Sunday, a 38-day season that showed a 40 percent increase in all-sources handle compared with the corresponding meeting at Hollywood Park in 2013, according to chairman Keith Brackpool.
Santa Anita’s winter-spring meeting operated in its traditional time period, from Dec. 26, 2013, to April 20 of this year, before the spring-summer meeting began on April 25, replacing dates previously held by Hollywood Park, which closed last December.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Majestic Harbor, the upset winner of Saturday’s $500,500 Gold Cup at Santa Anita, will make his next start Aug. 24 in the $1 million Pacific Classic at Del Mar, a chance for the 6-year-old to enhance his position as a contender Nov. 1 for the Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita.
Majestic Harbor gave owner Ron Beegle, who races as Gallant Stable, and trainer Sean McCarthy their first Grade 1 wins. Equally as important, Majestic Harbor received a fees-paid berth to the BC Classic through the Breeders’ Cup Win and You’re In program.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Sheza Smoke Show was given a rest in March after she finished fifth in her stakes debut in the China Doll Stakes on turf at Santa Anita. Trainer Peter Eurton was unhappy with what he saw from the 3-year-old filly.
“I told the owners, ‘We have no chance of beating those fillies at this time,’ ” Eurton recalled on Sunday. “She was light and needed weight on her.”
ELMONT, N.Y. – Wicked Strong has not worked since his fourth-place finish June 7 in the Belmont Stakes, but that likely will change next week, according to trainer Jimmy Jerkens.
"I've just been trying to charge him up a little after the Belmont," Jerkens said Sunday while schooling three horses in the paddock prior to the day's races. "I think it's working. He's doing good. I'll work him in a week, maybe before."
Jerkens plans to take the Jim Dandy-Travers route with Wicked Strong, who won the Wood Memorial before finishing a traffic-troubled fourth in the Kentucky Derby.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Untapable came out of her galloping victory in the Mother Goose at Belmont Park nicely, according to Steve Asmussen's New York-based assistant Toby Sheets, who said the race did not appear to take very much out of her.
"She walked this morning and had good energy for a horse who has just raced," Sheets said.
