ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Trainer Ashlee Brnjas will be hoping to win one for Niigon when she sends out Reconnect, a daughter of that late stallion, for Sunday’s Bunty Lawless Stakes.
Niigon, who died suddenly last Sunday at age 11, was owned by Chiefswood Stable but was standing at the Colebrook Farm of Ashlee’s father, owner and breeder John Brnjas, and was the sire of many of the outfit’s runners.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – The durable Pender Harbour will be favored to defend his title in the $125,000 Bunty Lawless, a one-mile Ontario-sired stakes at Woodbine Sunday.
Pender Harbor was voted Canada’s champion 3-year-old in 2011, during which he captured two-thirds of the Canadian Triple Crown. One of his better performances was a four-length score over soft turf in the Bunty Lawless.
“I thought he ran a great race last year,” said trainer Mike DePaulo. “I put a set of blinkers on him, and off he went. He went to the lead and kept going.”
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Musketier didn’t exactly go out with a flourish. But the 10-year-old horse did come home safe and sound after finishing last of seven in the 50th and final start of his career in Keeneland’s Grade 3 Sycamore Stakes over 1 1/2 miles of turf on Thursday.
Donnie Richardson, the veteran racing official who has long been associated with Churchill Downs and its signature race, the Kentucky Derby, will leave the company at the end of the year, Churchill announced on Friday.
ELMONT, N.Y. - After giving Carried Interest a strong gallop at Aqueduct on Thursday morning, trainer Rick Violette said he still has not yet decided where Carried Interest, runner-up in the Futurity at Belmont, would make his next start.
His options are the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Sprint at Santa Anita on Nov. 2 or the Grade 2, $200,000 Nashua at Aqueduct on Nov. 4.
[BREEDERS' CUP 2012: DRF top 10 lists, video replays, latest news]
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Kindergarden Kid proved another shrewd high-end claim for trainer Mike Maker when getting up in the shadow of the wire Thursday to win the Grade 3, $100,000 Sycamore Stakes on the Keeneland turf.
With Julien Leparoux riding for Maker and owners Ken and Sarah Ramsey, Kindergarden Kid finished a neck in front of Ioya Bigtime, the race-long leader in a field of seven older horses. Miami Deco was third and Rahystrada was fourth.
ELMONT, N.Y. – It’s Tricky sharpened her speed for a potential start in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint with a bullet five-furlong move in 1:00.06 late Thursday morning over the Belmont Park training track.
The quirky It’s Tricky came out after 10 a.m. for her breeze with jockey Eddie Castro in the irons. After backing up to the seven-eighths pole, It’s Tricky left her pony at the 5 1/2-furlong pole and after going her first eighth in 13.44 seconds, she zipped around from the half-mile pole to the wire in 46.62 seconds.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Compliance Officer, listed as the 5-2 morning-line favorite for Saturday’s $175,000 Mohawk Stakes at Belmont Park, was scratched from the race due to an ankle injury that will likely sideline him the remainder of the year, trainer Bruce Brown said Saturday morning.
Brown said Compliance Officer came out of his last work with an issue but he was hoping the horse could recover in time to run.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Short fields in dirt races may be a fact of life nowadays, but you would never know it by the 26 runners entered in the Bertram F. Bongard and Joseph A. Gimma Stakes, a pair of seven-furlong races for 2-year-old New York-breds that each received a purse boost to $125,000 this year.
A full gate of 14 will line up for the 34th B.F. Bongard, which is carded as the fifth of 10 races Saturday at Belmont Park, and thus the lead-off leg of the pick six. Post time is 3 p.m. Eastern.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Circumstances are made to order Saturday for Kindle, a sharp front-runner who should be loose on the lead in the Grade 3 Sen. Ken Maddy Stakes at Santa Anita.
“I love the setup,” trainer Gary Mandella admitted. “Some of these horses have shown speed, but if you just go on their last race, my filly is the speed of the field.”
Nine fillies and mares entered the $100,000 Maddy, a turf sprint that Kindle and jockey Edwin Maldonado figure to control early. The challenge is maintaining control late while moving up in class.
