INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Red-hot jockey Joel Rosario won four races at Betfair Hollywood Park for the 11th time in his career on Thursday.
While Rosario is based on the East Coast on a year-round basis, he plans to spend enough time in California this month that he might crack the top 10 in the jockey standings, at least briefly, before the meeting ends on Dec. 22.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Sweet Reason, winner of the Grade 1 Spinaway and fourth as the favorite in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies, is expected to return to trainer Leah Gyarmati’s Belmont Park barn early next week and begin preparation for a 3-year-old campaign.
Unlike Ria Antonia, the Juvenile Fillies winner who is being pointed to the Kentucky Derby and will stable in New Orleans, Sweet Reason’s spring goal is the Kentucky Oaks. She will remain in New York and likely make her 3-year-old debut in the $100,000 Busher Stakes over Aqueduct’s inner track on Feb. 1.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Bahamian Squall served notice he would be a sprinter to reckon with in 2013 when he closed out his 3-year-old campaign last December with a one-sided victory against statebreds in the Sunshine State Stakes. And sure enough, he made good on that promise.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Ultimate Destiny completed a dream season for owner/trainer Alec Fehr by winning Wednesday night’s $125,000 Sir Barton Stakes at Woodbine with determination under Eurico Da Silva.
Ultimate Destiny, the 126-pound highweight in the field of Ontario-sired runners, conceded significant weight to his rivals, including favored Pender Harbour, who wound up third. It was Urban Forester who gave Ultimate Destiny all that he could handle in the 1 1/16-mile event, but he caught that 15-1 shot on the wire after kicking in strongly in the last furlong.
Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies winner Ria Antonia will spend the winter at Fair Grounds, where the plan will be to run her against males in Kentucky Derby prep races, co-owner Ron Paolucci said Thursday.
Paolucci’s Looch Racing Stable and Christopher Dunn own Ria Antonia, who is trained by Jeremiah Englehart. His assistant, Elizabeth Dobles, who was at Santa Anita with the filly for the Breeders’ Cup, will come to Fair Grounds with her, Paolucci said.
NEW ORLEANS – With Grade 1 winners Joyful Victory and Believe You Can – the big girls of the stable – gone, trainer Larry Jones is looking toward promising young horses as a foundation for success at this Fair Grounds meet.
“We expect to have a good meet,” Jones said. “We expect to come out of here with some horses.”
It won’t be easy to fill the holes left by Joyful Victory and Believe You Can.
| Perfect Jersey |
| Got a confidence builder in Phoenix, where the Perfect Soul gelding defeated optional maiden claimers at one mile on turf. Second place finisher, Mancala, returned to win. Back in the barn of Matt Chew, who has won five of his last 20 ( 25 per cent) moving from turf to synthetic. |
