The Sonoma County Fair in Santa Rosa is going old school during its three-week meeting with five-day race weeks, and track officials hope having the only turf course on the California fair circuit will allow them to fill races. Santa Rosa opens its 15-day meet on Wednesday and races Wednesdays through Sundays until the meet ends Aug. 12.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Owner Martin Schwartz has a long history of buying horses based in Europe, bringing them to the United States and winning graded stakes with them.
Schwartz hopes that Samitar can follow in the hoofprints of Stacelita, Angara, and Gorella when she makes her North American debut in Wednesday’s Grade 2, $200,000 Lake George Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at Saratoga.
A solid eight-horse field which includes six graded or group stakes winners was entered for the Lake George, scheduled for 1 1/16 miles over the Mellon Turf Course.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Similar to his champion stablemate Acclamation, Norvsky has proven very good at defending titles in stakes races.
Acclamation, the champion older male of 2011, won the Grade 1 Eddie Read Stakes for the second straight year on Saturday. Earlier this year, he won the Grade 1 Charles Whittingham Handicap for the third consecutive year.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Gabriel Charles on Saturday was trainer Jeff Mullins’s first 2-year-old winner of the meeting. Even with that distinction, he is not considered Mullins’s top prospect in the division.
Next Saturday in a maiden race, Mullins starts the highly regarded 2-year-old Dry Summer, who was fourth in his debut at Betfair Hollywood Park on July 1.
Complete coverage of racing at Del Mar: News, PPs, and video
DEL MAR, Calif. - The 3-year-old filly Winding Way is bound for a stakes later this summer after extending her unbeaten streak to two races with an easy win in an optional claimer on Saturday.
Owned by breeder B. Wayne Hughes, Winding Way ran 6 1/2 furlongs in 1:16.87, winning by 7 1/4 lengths. She earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 97.
“All I have to do is feed her,” Gaines said. “She’s so amazing.”
AUBURN, Wash. - Three horses with designs on the Grade 3 Longacres Mile finished heads apart Sunday in the $50,000 Mt. Rainier Handicap at Emerald Downs. Hudson Landing, making his first local start, prevailed by a head over the fast-closing St Liams Halo, with Winning Machine another head back in third. The winner ran 1 1/6 miles on a very fast track in 1:40.77 and paid $5.40.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Del Mar showed gains in ontrack and all-sources average handle but a decline in ontrack average attendance through Sunday, the fifth day of the 37-day meeting.
Complete coverage of racing at Del Mar: News, PPs, and video
Average ontrack handle increased 8 percent from the first five days of last year’s meeting, to $2,649,568, while all-sources handle, including simulcast locations and account wagering, was $12,227,863, an increase of 2.4 percent over the corresponding week in 2011.
DEL MAR, Calif. – When trainer Bob Baffert arrived here at Del Mar with Eden’s Moon, he wasn’t sure where she would run. All the major races for 3-year-old fillies at this meet are on the turf, so last Monday, he gave Eden’s Moon a test drive over the course. She worked so well that Baffert decided to run her on Sunday in the Grade 2, $150,000 San Clemente Handicap, and Eden’s Moon ran back to that work, leading from start to finish in the one-mile grass race.
Leonard Blach and Mark Allen, who won the 2009 Kentucky Derby with Mine That Bird, now have the early favorite for the All American Futurity for Quarter Horses after Carters Cookie dominated the Grade 1, $700,000 Rainbow Futurity at Ruidoso Downs on Sunday.
The Rainbow is the second leg of Ruidoso’s rich series for 2-year-olds, which culminates with the Grade 1, $2.4 million All American Futurity on Labor Day. Trials for the All American are held in August.
Unloch the Fury maintained her sharp form Sunday in the $40,000 Columbine, winning her second straight race in the 1 1/16-mile stakes for fillies and mares at Arapahoe Park in Aurora, Colo. Unloch the Fury came into the Columbine off a nose win in an allowance at SunRay Park in New Mexico.
Unloch the Fury ($6.40) stalked the pace Sunday, then forged to a half-length win over Lady Contender, covering the distance over a track rated fast in 1:44.93. Russell Vicchrilli rode Unloch the Fury for trainer Tony Klenakis.
