ELMONT, N.Y. - Despite the fact the Belmont Park turf courses are not firm, Gio Ponti will run in Saturday’s Grade 1, $600,000 Man o’ War Stakes, trainer Christophe Clement confirmed at 1:30 p.m. Saturday.
"Running," Clement wrote in a text after he met with owner Shane Ryan.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – The 3-year-old graded stakes winner Premier Pegasus and the graded-stakes-placed Riveting Reason are being prepared for comebacks later this year, according to Maria Ayala, the assistant to owner-trainer Myung Kwon Cho.
Premier Pegasus, scratched from the Santa Anita Derby the day before the race with a hairline fracture of the cannon bone of his left foreleg, is within three weeks of returning to racetrack training and is at a local farm.
“He’s almost ready to come back,” Ayala said.
MIAMI - Trainer David Fawkes was forced to scratch Apriority from Saturday’s $350,000 Smile Sprint Handicap due to a foot abscess.
Fawkes said the abscess flared up after Apriority turned in his final prep for the Smile, a bullet three furlongs in 35, on Tuesday.
Harold Wyner has only a small stable of horses at Parx Racing, so he flies under the radar of most casual horseplayers. But pay attention when Wyner brings back a horse on short rest.
Wyner, whose record is a respectable 7 for 35 over the past two seasons, including 5 for 19 (26 percent) at Parx so far in 2011, does some of his best work when he brings back a sharp horse quickly. He shows a 3-for-9 record with a high $3.59 return on investment with horses coming back in 14 days or less.
ELMONT, N.Y. - There is a pick-six carryover of $34,680 Saturday at Belmont Park and there shouldn’t be.
The New York Racing Association will conduct an internal investigation to see where a communication breakdown occurred on Friday that resulted in the mutuel department enacting a New York state rule that mandates if two or more races in the pick-six sequence are transferred from the turf to the dirt after wagering has closed, then 75 percent of the pick-six pool must be carried over into the next live racing program.
Mighty B Valiant not only emerged as the fastest qualifier for the Grade 1, $700,000 Rainbow Futurity for Quarter Horses during 22 trials Friday at Ruidoso Downs, but he also was one of three horses to make the July 24 finale for owners Terry Bell and Bud Hill and trainer Raymond Vargas.
The owner-trainer team will also be represented in the finale by second fastest-qualifier Jess Cuervo, and eighth-fastest qualifier Ym Quick. Jockey G.R. Carter rode all three horses, and was also aboard the third-fastest qualifier, Feature Mr. Bojangles.
ALTOONA, Iowa - Beware the Devil turned Friday evening's $107,036 Iowa Stallion Futurity into a procession, pulling away from a stretched-out group of nine 2-year-old rivals to score by 10 1/4 lengths.
Beware the Devil surged clear leaving the turn under Alex Birzer. He returned $9.40 and covered the 5 1/2 furlong distance in 1:05.02. Trained by Lynn Chleborad, he earned $69,429 for owner-breeder Donald Shrage.
The Hollywood Gold Cup began in 1938 as the feature race of the new Hollywood Park race track. Here are the most memorable moments in the history of the race. Video courtesy of Hollywood Park
On July 16, 1938, Seabiscuit won the first ever Hollywood Gold Cup, running the 1 1/4 miles in 2:03.80. The time itself was not outstanding, but the race was a critical win for the 5-year-old, helping catapult him to the Horse of the Year award for 1938. Jockey George Woolf rode the winners in the first three Gold Cups.
ELMONT, N.Y. - The 3-year-old Jack London was entered in stakes races at both Delaware Park and Monmouth Park for Saturday, but instead found a better - albeit less prestigious - spot Sunday at Belmont Park.
Coming off an eye-catching 12-length maiden win here on May 28, Jack London will take the next step in a first-level allowance race going a mile at Belmont, where he will face five other horses.
With just two months before the start of Turfway Park’s fall meet Sept. 8, no determination has been made whether the track will host its Kentucky Cup Day of stakes races.
The Kentucky Cup was canceled last year because contesting the stakes would have depleted the track’s purse account of approximately $400,000 – money that was deemed needed for declining overnight purses.
