Balooga Bull, who has stamped himself as the best horse at Assiniboia Downs, will be looking to wind up his sophomore campaign on a high note when he faces eight rivals in Saturday’s Gold Cup.
The $50,000 Gold Cup, a 1 1/8-mile race which is the premier local test for 3-year-olds and upward, will go as the last of eight races on a program that also includes the $50,000 Winnipeg Futurity for 2-year-olds.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – It’s not like North American racing fans require regular reminders concerning the superiority of European grass horses, but Arlington Million Day provided one anyway. Euros won three of Million Day’s four major races, and with better luck Million runner-up Afsare might have made it a clean overseas sweep. A month later the landscape looks the same, with two European imports among the favorites Saturday in the Grade 3, $175,000 Pucker Up Stakes, a 1 1/8-mile grass race for 3-year-old fillies.
The 3-year-old filly Charged Cotton successfully handled a stretch out from 5 1/2 furlongs to a mile last month. Now, she will attempt to run an additional furlong while stepping up to stakes company.
Charged Cotton also will be moving into Maryland-bred company for the first time Saturday in the $100,000 All Brandy Stakes, scheduled for 1 1/8 miles on the turf course at Laurel Park. She is cross-entered in Saturday’s $50,000 Christiana for 3-year-old fillies at Delaware Park.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Are You Kidding Me, who won the allowance prep for the Summer Stakes over a mediocre group, will jump up to Grade 2 stakes company Saturday at Woodbine in the $250,000 Summer. The one-mile grass race for 2-year-olds is a Breeders’ Cup Win and You’re In event, meaning the winner receives a paid trip to the BC Juvenile Turf in November at Santa Anita.
Saturday’s card also includes the $250,000 Natalma, a Win and You’re In for the BC Juvenile Fillies Turf.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Turallure won last year’s Grade 1 Woodbine Mile for trainer Charlie Lopresti at odds of 6-1.
But when Wise Dan goes postward for Lopresti in this year’s $1 million Woodbine Mile on Sunday it will be at a considerably lower price, based on his dominant last-out victory in Saratoga’s Grade 2 Fourstardave over one mile of yielding going.
Post positions for the Woodbine Mile were announced here Thursday at a ceremonial draw in the trackside tent.
Four weeks after being good enough to salvage a dead heat for third in the Arlington Million, Rahystrada will be back in Franklin, Ky., to defend his title in the premier race of the Kentucky Downs meet, the Grade 3 Kentucky Turf Cup.
All signs point to him being good enough to win again.
“I think he’s obviously as good as he was last year,” said Scooter Hughes, who trains 8-year-old Rahystrada for Robert Courtney Jr. “He hasn’t shown any signs of slowing down or not wanting to do it.”
They’re all new, and they’re all pretty good. Three $75,000 stakes are on the Saturday undercard at Kentucky Downs leading into the annual showcase race, the Kentucky Turf Cup, and each looks like a race worth renewing in future years at the turf-only track in Franklin, Ky.
Two of those races are for 2-year-olds, essentially filling a spot on the Kentucky racing calendar once occupied by Kentucky Cup events at Turfway Park, while the other is a pseudo-counterpart to the Turf Cup for fillies and mares.
Here is a rundown of those supporting events:
Stormy Lord and Cantonic, who are a combined 3 for 3 over the turf course at Parx Racing, could go head to head from gate to wire when they clash in Saturday’s $250,000 Pennsylvania Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association President’s Cup.
The 5-year-old Stormy Lord, who shipped in from Woodbine to upset last year’s President’s Cup at 9-1, figures to be a far shorter price when he defends his title in the 1 1/8-mile turf race. He is dropping in class and cutting back in distrance off a runner-up effort, beaten three-quarters of the length, in the Grade 2 Sky Classic at 1 1/4 miles.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Leading trainer Mark Casse will spring into action Saturday at Woodbine, when he runs Spring in the Air and Spring Venture in the $250,000 Natalma Stakes.
The Grade 2 turf route for 2-year-old fillies is an important Breeders’ Cup Win and You’re In event, with the winner earning a fees-paid trip to the BC Juvenile Fillies Turf in November at Santa Anita. The Natalma has produced the last two BC Juvenile Fillies Turf winners, More Than Real, who finished second in the Natalma, and Stephanie’s Kitten, who was third in the Natalma.
Lon Wiggins won the first graded stakes of his training career at Arlington last Saturday, when Gold Edge captured the Grade 3 Arlington-Washington Lassie by a neck, her third win from three starts this summer. The win was satisfying for Wiggins. Gold Edge is a 2-year-old filly with more than her fair share of quirks. Wiggins and his barn patiently have helped Gold Edge through them, and the filly has prospered.
But just as Wiggins, 43, has developed the most talented horse he’s ever trained, she is on the verge of leaving him.
