LOUISVILLE, Ky. - When he guided Orb to a decisive triumph Saturday in the Kentucky Derby, jockey Joel Rosario completed an amazing run that began five weeks earlier with his victory aboard Animal Kingdom in the $10 million Dubai World Cup.
In between winning two of the most prestigious and important races in the world, Rosario also found time to set a record for victories at the Keeneland spring meet and to kick off the 2013 Churchill Downs season by winning five races on opening night.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Liaison saved Saturday for jockey Martin Garcia.
As recently as late April, Garcia was hoping to gain a mount in Saturday’s Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs. When his intended ride, Govenor Charlie, was withdrawn last week and nothing else materialized in the days before entries were taken, Garcia wound up staying in California to ride Liaison in the $150,000 Mervyn LeRoy Handicap at Betfair Hollywood Park.
Garcia made the most of the opportunity. He gave Liaison an ideal ride to win the Grade 2 race for older horses over 1 1/16 miles.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - It literally rained on trainer Todd Pletcher’s Kentucky Derby parade.
After a week where everything went swimmingly for the five-time Eclipse Award winning trainer, Pletcher’s quintet of Derby contenders floundered in the slop at Churchill Downs in the 139th Run for the Roses. The best Pletcher could do was a third-place finish with Revolutionary, the 6-1 second choice.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Here are the top-five finishers, with all available mutuel prices involving the 139th Kentucky Derby on Saturday at Churchill Downs:
Top 5 order of finish, $2 mutuels
1 – Orb, No. 16, win $12.80; place, $7.40; show $5.40
2 – Golden Soul, No. 4, place, $38.60; show, $19.40
3 – Revolutionary, No. 3, show, $5.40
4 – Normandy Invasion, No. 5
5 – Mylute, No. 6
She’s back and better than ever, if Hessonite’s seasonal debut in the Beaugay Stakes is any indication.
Last of six in the 2012 Beaugay on yielding turf before going on to win four stakes and a second straight New York-bred title, Hessonite ($9.80) turned in an exhilarating performance in this year’s edition to inhale the leaders in deep stretch under minimal urging from Junior Alvarado, who swept Saturday’s first two graded turf stakes of the year in New York.
Du Da Dandy and Hard Cider both became stakes winners at Will Rogers Downs on Saturday, when they accounted for separate $50,000 divisions of the Oklahoma Stallion Stakes.
Du Da Dandy ($8.40) controlled the tempo from the start in the 3-year-old colts and geldings division run in the slop, and drew off by 8 3/4 lengths over 2-5 favorite Chuck. It was another 20 lengths back in third to Okie Can Do.
Lubash was the most accomplished 1 1/16-mile turf runner going in, and he burnished his resume by winning Saturday’s Grade 3, $150,000 Fort Marcy in stakes-record time for trainer Christophe Clement, whose other horse in the race, Speaking of Which, ran last as the 7-5 favorite.
Lubash ($11.80) raced three wide throughout under Junior Alvarado as King Kreesa was hustled out to set fractions of 23.23 seconds, 45.71 and 1:08.54 over a Widener turf course that has been playing very fast through a dry and sunny spring.
PHOENIX - The $35,000 Hasta La Vista Handicap, the traditional closing-day event, brings down the curtain on the Turf Paradise meet Tuesday, and the 1 7/8-mile turf marathon drew a field of 12, headed by Southern California raider Porfido.
Also on the Tuesday card is the $35,000 ATBA Spring Sales Stakes, a five-furlong main-track event for 2-year-olds who were consigned to the fall sale. The race drew a field of 12.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Spring in the Air, Canada’s reigning champion 2-year-old filly, held off a charging Smartyfly to take the $150,000 Fury Stakes under Patrick Husbands at Woodbine Saturday.
Spring in the Air tracked the leaders on the outside through slow fractions in the seven-furlong sprint for 3-year-old fillies. She hit the front nearing the eighth pole, before holding sway to prevail by a half-length in 1:23.51.
