AUBURN, Wash. – A $10,000 claimer for fillies and mares will serve as the featured race Monday at Emerald Downs. First post for the nine-race card is 2 p.m. Pacific.
Front-runners Dream Caller and Roarified are likely to attract the most interest among the seven entrants in the six-furlong feature.
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas – Steve Asmussen has left few prizes unclaimed at his home track of Lone Star Park, where he ranks as the all-time winningest trainer with 1,043 local victories and $23 million in stable earnings. But one major stakes has eluded Asmussen, and on Monday he appears primed to win his first Lone Star Park Handicap.
Two full fields of turf sprinters – all seeking their second lifetime victory and most with little or no experience racing on grass – make for a difficult early daily double Tuesday evening at Mountaineer Park.
The first two races on a nine-race card that begins at 7 p.m. Eastern are seven-furlong allowances for nonwinners of two lifetime. Handicappers looking for a simplistic approach might do well by keying the two horses trained by J. Michael Baird – R. J. Says in the opener and Rocko’s Gizmo in race 3.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Trainer Dallas Stewart decided on Saturday to wait at least one more day to breeze his Kentucky Derby runner-up Golden Soul.
[BELMONT STAKES: Probable field and latest updates]
Golden Soul has been training steadily, but has not breezed, since finishing 2 1/2 lengths behind Orb in the May 4 Derby. Stewart has been hesitant to commit to a specific date for a workout, which he said “will be a real easy-half mile anyway. The horse is doing great in his gallops every day.”
ELMONT, N.Y. – Despite there being only six horses in the race, trainer Larry Jones had some trepidation before post positions were drawn for Monday’s Grade 1, $400,000 Ogden Phipps at Belmont Park.
Running two horses with similar running styles – Grade 1 winners Joyful Victory and Believe You Can – Jones did not want the two front-runners next to each other.
So, Jones was quite pleased when Joyful Victory drew the rail and Believe You Can post 6 in the Phipps.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Watsdachances, beaten at odds-on by Unbelievable Dream in the Appalachian Stakes last month, will look to even the score in Monday’s Grade 2, $200,000 Sands Point Stakes at Belmont Park.
The 19th running of the Sands Point, scheduled for the inner turf at 1 1/16 miles, drew six 3-year-old fillies for turf, along with main-track-only entrant Fusaichiswonderful. It is carded as the seventh of 11 races, and is the first leg of an all-stakes pick four with a $500,000 guaranteed pool. Post time is 4:13 p.m. Eastern.
OCEANPORT, N.J. – Bella Castani puts a two-race winning streak on the line as the solid favorite on Monday in the Little Silver Stakes for 3-year-old fillies on the turf at Monmouth Park.
The Little Silver and Red Cross for female sprinters, both worth $60,000, are the leading events on the 11-race holiday card starting at 12:50 p.m. Eastern.
After a maiden win at Gulfstream Park, Bella Castani headed north to Belmont Park for a rallying victory in the Tweedside Stakes as the 4-5 choice.
Trainer David Jacobson doesn’t bring many horses to race at Finger Lakes, but when he does, he frequently wins.
Since 2009, Jacobson has gone 6 for 13 (46 percent) with horses shipped to the western New York racetrack. He has a good shot to pad his already-impressive statistics when he saddles the uncoupled entry of Be Bullish and Uncle T Seven, who are pegged as the top two choices on the morning line for Monday’s $50,000 George W. Barker Handicap.
ALBANY, Calif. – Monday’s Grade 3, $100,000 All American Stakes at Golden Gate Fields looks like a mismatch on paper.
Millionaire Tres Borrachos drew the rail and has seven rivals, none of whom can match his credentials.
If two Grade 2 victories, a second and a third in Grade 1 events, and seven other stakes placings aren’t enough, handicappers may be swayed by the two straight 100 Beyer Speed Figures the 8-year-old Ecton Park gelding has earned in his most recent starts for trainer Martin Jones.
It almost seems too easy.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Two longstanding handicapping methods will be tested Monday at Belmont Park when Flat Out runs in the Grade 1, $750,000 Metropolitan Handicap, one of the most prestigious races on the New York Racing Association calendar.
Those who subscribe to the horses-for-courses angle will put their money on Flat Out, who is 4 for 4 over Belmont’s main track – 3 for 19 everywhere else – including two wins in the Grade 1 Jockey Club Gold Cup as well as victories in last year’s Grade 2 Suburban and last month’s Grade 3 Westchester.
