Colonial Downs in New Kent, Va., will run on a Thursday-through-Saturday live racing schedule next year, the first season under new owner Churchill Downs Inc., the company announced on Wednesday after getting regulatory approval for the 2023 meet.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - The 132-day Woodbine meet wrapped up Sunday with a record all-sources handle of $620 million, according to Woodbine Entertainment commercial president Michael Copeland.

The 126-day 2023 meet is scheduled to begin on Saturday, April 22, pending regulatory approval by the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario.

Geovanni Franco, who has ridden in Arkansas, Kentucky, and Indiana in recent months, will resume riding in California for the first time in slightly more than a year later this week, according to his new agent, Jack Carava.

Franco plans to ride the final weekend of the Los Alamitos December meeting on Friday through Sunday and prepare for the start of the Santa Anita winter-spring meeting that begins on Dec. 26, Carava said.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Taiba on dirt and Balnikhov on turf are among the most conspicuous nominees (i.e., likely favorites) to six graded stakes scheduled for the Dec. 26 opening-day card at Santa Anita.

Nominations were released this week for the winter-meet opening day card that includes three Grade 1, $300,000 stakes and three Grade 2, $200,000 stakes. Taiba is the early favorite for the Grade 1 Runhappy Malibu at seven furlongs; Balnikhov likewise racing a mile on turf in the Grade 2 Santa Anita Mathis Mile. Both races are for 3-year-olds.

She’s All Wolfe, who established herself as an elite Oklahoma-bred with earnings of more than $750,000, has been retired, trainer Donnie Von Hemel said Tuesday.

She is based at Oaklawn Park and will soon ship to a Kentucky farm for her breeder and owner, Robert Zoellner.

“The decision was made just recently,” Von Hemel said. “We were toying with running her a time or two and this and that and when it came down to it, everybody was in agreement to retire her.”

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Today’s Flavor looks to be a future New York-bred stakes horse after following up his 8 1/2-length maiden win Nov. 27 with a similar front-running, 8 1/2-length victory Sunday in a first-level allowance race at Aqueduct. Both races were against statebreds.

Put on the lead by Manny Franco, Today’s Flavor extended his advantage at every call, running six furlongs in 1:11.23 and earning an 89 Beyer Speed Figure, one point higher than his maiden score.

Slow Down Andy, a three-time graded stakes winner who was third in the Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile on Nov. 5 at Keeneland, will start in a sprint for the first time since the summer in the Grade 1 Malibu Stakes for 3-year-olds at seven furlongs on Dec. 26 at Santa Anita.

Slow Down Andy was third at 17-1 in the BC Dirt Mile, finishing 1 3/4 lengths behind Cody’s Wish. Earlier this year, Slow Down Andy won the Grade 3 Sunland Park Derby at 1 1/8 miles in March after engaging in a speed duel. He won his turf debut in the Grade 2 Del Mar Derby at 1 1/8 miles, leading throughout.

With an asterisk, Practical Move is a winner around two turns this year.

On Oct. 10 at Santa Anita, Practical Move finished second by 1 1/2 lengths in a maiden special weight race at a mile to Fort Bragg, who was disqualified from first for causing interference. The ruling put Practical Move in the winner’s circle.

Practical Move can prove he fits in top-level two-turn races when he starts in Saturday’s Grade 2 Los Alamitos Futurity at 1 1/16 miles.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Kazushi Kimura won his second straight Woodbine riding title when the 132-day meet wrapped up Sunday.

Kazushi Kimura, who took the last week of the meet off, won 152 races from 755 rides, and his mounts earned a meet-leading $8.9 million.

Rafael Hernandez ranked second with 122 wins. He missed the last two days of the meet after suffering broken ribs in a spill Friday.

Hernandez’s win on Fashionably Fab in Friday’s Shady Well Stakes made him the meet’s leading stakes-winning jockey by a 16-15 margin over Kimura.

Highly promising 2-year-old colt Extra Anejo has been taken out of training because of an injury, trainer Steve Asmussen reported on Sunday. 

Asmussen and the colt’s owner, Winchell Thoroughbreds, had hoped to make the Gun Runner Stakes on Dec. 26 at Fair Grounds with Extra Anejo, but a relatively minor injury has forced a change in plans. 

“He has a small chip in a hind ankle. It’s not ideal timing. The prognosis is good, but it’s not the timing anybody wants,” Asmussen said.