2014-15 Racing Dates

December 6, 2014 - March 21, 2015

Post Time

12:22 p.m. ET

Handicapping Information

STICKNEY, Ill. – This time, Last Gunfighter really is getting a break. And after the 13-month run the 4-year-old has put together, a winter rest has been well earned.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – It has been a year of many firsts for Javier Castellano. He hopes it culminates with his first Eclipse Award as North America’s champion jockey.

Entering the final four weeks of racing in 2013, Castellano is first in the nation in races won with 335 and first in purse earnings with $25,234,475. In the purse-money won category, Castellano is only $400,377 behind the single-year record set last year by Ramon Dominguez, winner of the last three Eclipse Awards, who was forced to retire after a spill in January.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Everything before the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies went ideally for Untapable, and everything since has gone well, too, which is why those closest to her are inclined to throw out her poor Breeders’ Cup performance and believe she can bounce back in the Grade 1, $500,000 Hollywood Starlet on Saturday at Betfair Hollywood Park.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – As horse vans streamed out the Churchill Downs stable gate Sunday and Monday for southbound destinations, a handful of trainers who ended the fall meet Saturday on a winning note departed with high hopes for the long winter ahead.

One of those was Dallas Stewart, who sent out Unbridled Forever to an eye-catching seven-furlong maiden victory that earned a 96 Beyer Speed Figure, easily the highest of any of the 12 winners on the meet-ending Stars of Tomorrow card, restricted to 2-year-olds.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Saturday’s Grade 2 Kennedy Road Stakes featured an intriguing matchup between two-time Canadian champion sprinter Essence Hit Man and this year’s divisional leader, Phil’s Dream, but it was Bear No Joke who got the last laugh when he prevailed at 17-1 under Emma-Jane Wilson.

Bear No Joke wore down the speedy Essence Hit Man in the stretch to beat him by a half-length in 1:08.63, which was 0.47 seconds off Essence Hit Man’s six-furlong Polytrack record. Bear No Joke earned a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 101.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Full Ransom, the winner of Saturday’s $100,250 Miesque Stakes for 2-year-old fillies, is likely to start early in the Santa Anita meeting in the Blue Norther Stakes over a mile on turf.

The Blue Norther is an overnight stakes and has yet to be scheduled. In past years, it was run in late December or in the first days of January.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Global View has earned a winter vacation after a successful stakes debut in Saturday’s $100,250 Generous Stakes for 2-year-olds on turf at Betfair Hollywood Park.

“I’m going to keep him on turf – in a pasture,” trainer Tom Proctor said.

Proctor said Global View will go to a farm in Florida in the coming days, with an eye on bringing the colt back to turf stakes in the spring.

“We can have him ready to go to Keeneland in April,” he said. “He’s pretty mature, and this will help him more.”

Bill Mott was still accepting congratulations Sunday morning at Belmont Park for Flat Out’s victory in Saturday’s Grade 1 Cigar Mile at Aqueduct.

When it comes to Flat Out, it might be the last time the Hall of Fame trainer gets to take kudos for a job well done. While nothing has been finalized, Mott seemed resigned to the fact that Flat Out soon will be headed to a farm somewhere to begin his second career as a stallion.

“Just what he did yesterday probably picks up the tempo of any offers that might have been out there,” Mott said. “It’s like winning the Met Mile.”

Up until Sunday morning, trainer Shug McGaughey had tried to curtail any thoughts of next spring’s Kentucky Derby when it came to his promising 2-year-old, Honor Code.

But the morning after Honor Code showed some heart, coming back on Cairo Prince, who had overtaken him in midstretch, to win Saturday’s Grade 2 Remsen by a nose, McGaughey allowed himself to get excited.