DEL MAR, Calif. – The meet didn’t start off very well for trainer Jerry Hollendorfer, but he’s finishing with a flourish. On Monday at Del Mar, Hollendorfer ran one-two in the Grade 2, $250,000 Yellow Ribbon Handicap for older female turf horses, as Halo Dolly earned her first graded stakes win at the expense of stablemate City to City.
VANCOUVER, British Columbia – Herbie D. was sent off as a prohibitive favorite in the $50,000 Derby Bar and Grill Express at Hastings on Monday and he didn’t disappoint as he cruised to an easy 2 3/4-length win over Stormy Canuck. He paid $2.60 for his dominating win in the six-furlong race for 3-year-olds and up.
One Dashing Eagle regained his status as the nation’s top-ranked 2-year-old Quarter Horse on Monday, when he rolled to a three-quarter length win over Sudden Thoughts in the Grade 1, $2.4 million All American Futurity at Ruidoso Downs. Pj Chick in Black, who had supplanted One Dashing Eagle off a stellar trial effort, finished a troubled sixth as the 3-5 favorite.
The All American is the richest race offered for Quarter Horses, and it closed out the meet at Ruidoso. The New Mexico track on Monday drew a record crowd of 24,106.
Final Count went first-to-last Monday to register a 4 1/4-length triumph in the $50,000 Cliff Guilliams Memorial, the closing-day feature of the 29-day Ellis Park meet in Henderson, Ky.
With jockey Corey Lanerie biding his time early, Final Count finished with a flourish, returning $7.20 as third choice in a field reduced to just six starters after the race was moved from the main track to the turf, with the distance revised from 1 1/16 miles to a mile. The winning time was 1:37.46 over a muddy track.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Due largely to more races and a summer of spectacular weather, the 2012 Saratoga meet posted significant increases in overall handle while showing modest gains in ontrack business.
Total average daily handle for the 40-day meet was $14,708,799, up 9 percent from the 2011 daily average of $13,493,636. Last year, Saratoga conducted only 39 cards, canceling the Aug. 28 card - the day after the Travers - due to Tropical Storm Irene.
OCEANPORT, N.J. - Another weekend at Monmouth Park, another stakes win for jockey Chris DeCarlo.
Finishing up the core portion of the meet with a flourish, DeCarlo guided Afleeting Lady to a 4 1/2-length win over Daddy's Honor on Monday in the $75,750 Lady's Secret for fillies and mares.
Ben’s Cat got up in the final strides in a three-way photo on Monday to capture the Grade 3, $350,000 Turf Monster Handicap at Parx Racing.
The victory by the 6-year-old gelding was significant on so many levels.
It was the second straight Turf Monster win for Ben’s Cat, a prize pupil for Maryland training legend King Leatherbury. Ben’s Cat improved to 17 for 26 in his career, with a sparkling 10-for-15 mark on the turf.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - It was worth the wait.
After having to scratch from the Saratoga Special on Aug. 12 due to a temperature, Shanghai Bobby showed that he might be one of the hottest 2-year-olds on the East Coast by rolling to a 3 3/4-length victory in Monday’s Grade 2, $300,000 Hopeful Stakes on closing day at Saratoga.
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Trainer Todd Pletcher worked his top two juvenile filly prospects, Dreaming of Julia and Kauai Katie, here Monday prior to shipping back to Belmont Park later this week.
Dreaming of Julia was the first of the pair to go, breezing an easy five furlongs in 1:02.41 and galloping out six furlongs in 1:15.76 immediately after the renovation break. Dreaming of Julia was scratched from Sunday’s Grade 1 Spinaway, part of the Stonestreet entry that also included the Steve Asmussen-trained Teen Pauline, who finished third as the odds-on favorite.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - At the September 2011 Keeneland yearling auction, trainer James Bond and his longtime client William Clifton were the underbidders for a daughter of Malibu Moon out of the dam Red Hot Bertie. They stopped at $300,000, and the filly was purchased for $310,000 by B. Wayne Hughes of Spendthrift Farm.
A few months later, Bond was a guest of Hughes at a cocktail party that, in part, was to show off Spendthrift’s new stallions, which included the Bond-trained Tizway, winner of last year’s Metropolitan and Whitney handicaps.
