Show Some Magic, a stakes winner who finished fifth in the $100,000 Damascus on the Breeders’ Cup Saturday undercard at Santa Anita, is being pointed for the $200,000 Zia Park Derby, said his trainer, Henry Dominguez.
The Zia Derby, to be run over 1 1/16 miles, is on Nov. 24. It is part of a program of stakes that includes the new $300,000 Zia Park Oaks.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Trainer Eddie Plesa Jr., a Calder regular for three decades, is stabled for the first time this winter at Palm Meadows, where he has more than 60 horses bedded down. They include Speak Logistics and Preakness and Florida Derby runner-up Itsmyluckyday, who is back in training after recuperating from surgery to repair a fractured ilium – part of the pelvis – suffered during the running of the Pegasus Stakes on June 16.
Diamond Bachelor, ninth in the BC Juvenile on Nov. 2, could start in the $750,000 CashCall Futurity at Betfair Hollywood Park on Dec. 14, trainer Patrick Biancone said.
“It’s in the back of our minds,” Biancone said.
Diamond Bachelor was beaten 9 1/2 lengths by New Year’s Day in the BC Juvenile. Biancone said a slow start and enduring kickback for the first time discouraged Diamond Bachelor. Ridden by Julien Leparoux, Diamond Bachelor was last of 13 on the final turn.
[bc_video_id:309773:]ETOBICOKE, Ontario – No older male has won back to back in open two-turn stakes on the main track at Woodbine this year.
On Sunday, trainer Josie Carroll will look to end that trend when she sends out James Street for the 1 1/16-mile Autumn, which offers Grade 2 status and a purse of $150,000.
“He’s in good order; he’s ready to roll,” said Carroll, who sent out the Kentucky-bred 6-year-old to win the Grade 3, 1 1/8-mile Durham Cup on Oct. 6.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Gentlemen’s Bet might well be headed for the Grade 1 Cigar Mile in New York, setting up the possibility of an intriguing clash with Goldencents and Golden Ticket, the one-two finishers in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile last weekend.
Gentlemen’s Bet also raced at Santa Anita last weekend, carrying an open lead past the furlong pole before settling for third in the six-furlong BC Sprint. Trainer Ron Moquett is interested to see how the 4-year-old colt will fare with a bit more distance.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – The partnership that owns Goldencents, winner of the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile at Santa Anita on Nov. 1, has been reduced from four partners to two, and the 3-year-old will start in the $500,000 Cigar Mile at Aqueduct on Nov. 30.
Owner Glenn Sorgenstein said Thursday that he and partner Josh Kaplan have privately purchased the ownership shares of Dave Kenney and Rick Pitino, the University of Louisville basketball coach. The four men owned Goldencents through the BC Dirt Mile.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Rookie Sensation, the winner of the Grade 2 Twilight Derby on Nov. 1, and Eblouissante, a half-sister to Zenyatta who sold for $2.1 million at Keeneland on Tuesday, will be among trainer John Shirreffs’s high-profile runners at the Santa Anita winter-spring meeting next year.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Centralinteligence could return to racing after undergoing surgery for a condylar fracture suffered Nov. 1 in the BC Dirt Mile, trainer Ron Ellis said.
Centralinteligence was eased in the BC Dirt Mile after racing in seventh for the first half of the race. He was vanned off and underwent surgery to have two stabilizing pins inserted in his right front leg over the weekend. The gelding was back at Ellis’s barn at Hollywood Park on Wednesday.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - New Year’s Day, the winner of the BC Juvenile, will not race again this year, trainer Bob Baffert said.
“I’ll freshen him up,” Baffert said. “I want to have him ready for the classics.”
New Year’s Day won his stakes debut in the BC Juvenile, closing from eighth in a field of 13 to catch 5-2 favorite Havana in the final furlong. New Year’s Day won the race over 1 1/16 miles by 1 1/4 lengths. Owned by Gary and Mary West, New Year’s Day beat maidens Aug. 31 at Del Mar in his second start, having finished third there in his debut on Aug. 17.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – It’s been a solid season for the barn of trainer Nick Gonzalez, which recently surpassed the $2 million earnings mark for the sixth time in the past seven years.
“We didn’t really win as many races as we wanted to,” Gonzalez said in his office here Wednesday morning. “But you’ve got to be happy when you win a Queen’s Plate, with Midnight Aria, and watch River Seven finish second in the other two Triple Crown races.”
