ALTOONA, Iowa – Following an arduous winter that has produced snow well into April, Prairie Meadows readies for its 25th annual spring/summer Thoroughbred meet with a game plan largely unchanged from recent seasons.
Racing secretary Pat Pope, who just completed another successful Oaklawn meet, returns to his native Iowa after a five-year stint at the helm of Delaware Park’s racing office.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Frivolous, an impressive winner at Keeneland in her 4-year-old debut Sunday, will remain on Polytrack by racing next in the Grade 3 Matron on May 24 at Arlington Park, said trainer Vicki Oliver.
“It looks like she’s finally putting it all together,” said Oliver, who trains Frivolous for her father, G. Watts Humphrey Jr. “She was rather inconsistent in some of her races last year but really trained well over the winter.”
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Up With the Birds, the 2013 Canadian Horse of the Year, will ship from Keeneland to his Woodbine base with the possibility of returning to the United States for the Dixie Stakes at Pimlico on the May 17 Preakness undercard, trainer Malcolm Pierce said.
Up With the Birds finished last of six as the 9-5 favorite in a classified turf allowance on opening weekend of the Keeneland spring meet, the first time the 4-year-old Stormy Atlantic colt has run worse than third in 10 career starts.
Constitution, the undefeated winner of the Florida Derby, will miss the Kentucky Derby and the rest of the Triple Crown because of a shin fracture, Elliott Walden, president and chief executive of co-owner WinStar Farm, said Wednesday.
Constitution, trained by Todd Pletcher, has won all three of his races at Gulfstream Park. He defeated maidens in his debut Jan. 11, then won a first-level allowance Feb. 22 before his victory in the Florida Derby on March 29.
Trainer Bret Calhoun and jockey David Cabrera jumped out to early leads in the trainer and jockey standings. Calhoun was the only trainer to win more than two races over the meet’s opening week, going 5 for 10, and Cabrera won with six of 23 mounts, giving him a two-win edge over Lindey Wade, who went 4 for 24.
The jockey colony is deeper this week with the additions of veterans Cliff Berry and Luis Quinonez, who sat out the first few days of Lone Star to complete the Oaklawn Park meet.
Ricardo Santana Jr. will have the mount on Tapiture if he runs in the Kentucky Derby, trainer Steve Asmussen said Tuesday.
Asmussen said he wants to see how Tapiture trains in the next two weeks before committing to the race but added that if Tapiture runs, Santana rides.
"He was fourth on Saturday," Asmussen said, referring to the Arkansas Derby, "which was disappointing. He arrived safely at Churchill Downs, is scheduled to gallop tomorrow, and is scheduled to breeze on Monday."
Opening week at Lone Star finished with high attendance Friday and Saturday, with Equibase reporting crowds of 15,633 Friday and 17,000 Saturday. Those crowds were bolstered by popular concerts both evenings. With a good percentage of the fans there for the music, per-capita wagering was low. Ontrack handle was $335,125 on Friday and $487,775 on Saturday, also per Equibase figures.
By way of comparison, without a concert on opening night this past Thursday, 6,145 fans attended and wagered $343,207.
Nominations for the Grade 3, $200,000 Texas Mile on April 26 don’t close until Thursday, but one invader for the race, Taptowne, is already on the Lone Star backstretch, readying for a start.
A homebred multiple stakes winner of more than $657,000 owned by Clovertown Farm, he finished third in the March 15 Razorback Handicap in his seasonal debut at Oaklawn Park, where he was based this winter. But rather than race him back in the Oaklawn Handicap, where he would have faced Will Take Charge and Revolutionary, his connections opted to ship him to Lone Star for the Texas Mile.
Shared Belief, last year’s champion 2-year-old male who has been sidelined all year with foot problems, took his first step toward a return to action with a three-furlong work at Golden Gate Fields on Tuesday morning that trainer Jerry Hollendorfer timed in 38.40 seconds over the Tapeta surface.
