ELMONT, N.Y. – When Pretty Boy Freud won last month’s Corma Ray at Belmont Park, it was the first stakes victory for trainer Leo O’Brien in 12 years.
As long as Pretty Boy Freud stays sound and healthy, O’Brien shouldn’t have to wait that long for his next stakes success.
Pretty Boy Freud will seek his third consecutive victory in Saturday’s $125,000 Hudson Stakes at Belmont Park against a field that includes the previous two Hudson winners, General Maximus (2010) and Driven by Success (2009).
STICKNEY, Ill. – In his last two Illinois-bred sprint-stakes starts at Hawthorne, Shrewd Operator went to post at odds of 4-5 and even money. One second into both races, his many backers were looking for a refund.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Compliance Officer, the claim of the year at least among New York-breds, will look to run his winning streak to five consecutive races when he takes on 10 rivals in Saturday’s $125,000 Mohawk Stakes at Belmont Park.
The Mohawk, shortened this year to 1 1/16 miles, is the final race on the 10-race card devoted to New York-breds.
Jess Tee Off will move closer to a sweep of Texas’s two richest races for his division Saturday night if he qualifies for the Grade 1, $1 million Texas Classic Quarter Horse Futurity. He is one of 126 entrants in the 13 trials that will be run at Lone Star Park. The horses with the 10 fastest times will advance to the finale Nov. 12.
Smiling Tiger, third in the 2010 Breeders’ Cup Sprint and winner of seven sprint stakes, may not start in the BC Sprint at Churchill Downs on Nov. 5, trainer Jeff Bonde said Thursday.
Smiling Tiger has not had a workout since late September and has not raced since finishing fourth in the Grade 1 Pat O’Brien Stakes at Del Mar on Aug. 28.
“We’ve had a few issues and we’re trying to determine whether we can make it,” Bonde said. “I don’t have any answers yet. He acts jarred up.”
The Breeders’ Cup may be two weeks away, but another Thoroughbred division takes its championship swing Saturday in New Jersey.
With total purses of $450,000, the 91st Far Hills Races showcases the best steeplechasers in training, headed by a competitive field of 14 in the Grade 1, $250,000 Grand National. Run at 2 5/8 miles, the Grand National is the fourth of six races on the card, which has a first post of 1 p.m., and it will go a long way toward deciding year-end honors.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Jenine Sahadi, who became the first woman to train the winner of the Santa Anita Derby in 2000 and won two Breeders’ Cup races in the 1990s, has retired from training.
Sahadi, 48, disbanded her stable at the end of the Del Mar meeting last month and recently moved to that area. A trainer for 18 years, she won 441 races, including the Breeders’ Cup Sprint with Lit de Justice in 1996 and Elmhurst in 1997 and the Santa Anita Derby with The Deputy in 2000.
ELMONT, N.Y. – The improvement in the New York breeding program is such that even though none of the three statebreds that has won Grade 1 races this year are participating, Saturday’s New York Showcase Day program at Belmont Park consists of 10 races with deep, competitive fields of talented horses.
With Grade 1 winners Giant Ryan and Weemissfrankie pointing to Breeders’ Cup races and Manhattan winner Mission Approved headed to the Japan Cup, there are still plenty of stakes winners sprinkled throughout the seven stakes races on the card.
ARCADIA, Calif. – The schedule of major stakes for 2-year-old fillies this fall did not match the development of Sister Moon, the highly promising filly owned by breeders Jerry and Ann Moss and trainer by John Sadler.
After an electrifying win in a maiden race over 5 1/2 furlongs at Del Mar on Aug. 21, it would not have been a surprise for Sister Moon to appear in a race such as the Grade 1 Oak Leaf Stakes over 1 1/16 miles at Santa Anita on Oct. 2.
Seven of the 11 fillies in Saturday's Joseph A. Gimma Stakes for 2-year-old fillies won their last starts, including Wildcat’s Smile, who beat the boys in the New York Breeders’ Futurity; and Shot Gun Pennie, who sat out that race after a wire-to-wire score over Wildcat’s Smile in the Lady Finger.
Shot Gun Pennie, trained by Carlos Martin, was climbing badly in the mud first out at Saratoga, but added blinkers for the Lady Finger and was never headed.
