The worlds of graded sprint stakes winners on dirt, turf .and synthetic collide when Pacific Ocean, Next Question, and Hoofit clash in Thursday’s $85,000 Around the Cape overnight stakes.
A field of 10 older males entered the six-furlong dash scheduled for the inner turf.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – A lull was supposed to follow Mike Maker after he set a record that figures to stand for many years at Keeneland last month.
Scratch that.
Maker has continued on a tear, winning with 8 of his first 17 starters at the Churchill Downs spring meet while also winning 4 of 11 at Belmont Park. Those numbers follow the gaudy 25 for 76 he posted when setting a record for most wins by a trainer at a Keeneland meet.
The absurdity of the repetitiveness might well have been illustrated best Sunday at Churchill.
When Russell Baze surpassed Laffit Pincay Jr. as the world’s winningest rider on Dec. 1, 2006, the prevailing question was how high would he take the mark. His longtime agent Ray Harris floated 12,000 as a realistic goal. And Harris’s prognosticating acumen is as good as his ability to pick winners for Baze to ride.
Baze has 11,932 victories going into Thursday’s Golden Gate Fields card. At his current rate, he should reach 12,000 during the Sonoma County Fair at Santa Rosa shortly before his 55th birthday on Aug. 7. Baze got victory No. 11,000 there on Aug. 14, 2010.
Dancin’ Lil is bred to make good use of the added ground she picks up in Thursday night’s third race at Lone Star Park. The first-level allowance for 3- and 4-year-old fillies will be run over 6 1/2 furlongs. A field of five will go, including Double Tapped, who is a half-sister to Grade 1 winner Paddy O’Prado.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Trainer Jorge Gutierrez was confident that dirt filly Warren’s Flasher would perform better on turf, though he underestimated the extent of her improvement.
Having trained her full sister – maiden turf specialist Warren’s Cracker – Gutierrez was dealing on pedigree information when he moved up Warren’s Flasher from a maiden-claiming dirt sprint to a starter-allowance turf route.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Jeranimo, a six-time stakes winner who was seventh in the Woodford Reserve Turf Classic at Churchill Downs on May 4, has returned to trainer Mike Pender’s California stable and is being pointed to the $300,000 Shoemaker Mile at Betfair Hollywood Park on June 30.
Jeranimo won the Grade 1 Shoemaker in 2012, his only win at that level.
“We’ll try to defend his title in the Shoemaker,” Pender said.
The distance of Thursday’s fifth race at Louisiana Downs, as well as the current profile of the track’s turf course, are among the reasons Watch My Smoke will make a rare start on grass in an allowance for 3-year-olds and up at about a mile. He is part of an eight-horse field that includes stakes winners Lee’s Spirit and Heavenville.
BALTIMORE – Orb’s triumph in the Kentucky Derby was viewed by some as a victory for the old-school training methods of Shug McGaughey.
When it comes to Goldencents, trainer Doug O’Neill – who won last year’s Derby and Preakness with I’ll Have Another – is employing some old-school methods of his own. As in two months old.
MIAMI – Trainer Stanley Gold doesn’t know all the particulars regarding Jackson Bend’s mishap last summer at Saratoga, which led to his premature retirement in October, or what exactly transpired during his brief visit to the breeding shed, which ultimately resulted in the Grade 1 winner being put back into training this spring. And he’s not asking, either.
Dan the Tin Man stayed just off the early pace while on the outside in the $100,000 Tom Ridge on Monday night before exploding into the stretch to win the six-furlong event at Presque Isle Downs.
Jockey Scott Spieth had a good hold on the Ricky Griffith-trained 3-year-old going down the backstretch. Spieth asked Dan the Tin Man on the turn, and he responded, drawing clear by two lengths in the stretch.
