Clarke Lane, second in an allowance race over a mile on Sunday at Santa Anita, could start in the $750,000 Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland on April 16, trainer Simon Callaghan said on Tuesday.
“It’s just a thought, but we could supplement to the Blue Grass,” Callaghan said of the Grade 1 race over 1 1/8 miles. “He’s a real tough horse and he’s not lost any weight from the race. It’s something to look at. It’s back quick but it is that time of year with 3-year-old colts.”
Maclean’s Music, who won his debut by 7 1/4 lengths in a six-furlong maiden race last month, earning a Beyer Speed Figure of 114, will make his next start at the Churchill Downs spring-summer meeting, assistant trainer Scott Blasi said.
Monday, Maclean’s Music worked five furlongs in 1:02.40, his second workout since the March 19 race. The Asmussen stable is expected to stay in California until the conclusion of the Santa Anita meeting on April 17 and move most of the runners to Kentucky.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Todd Pletcher wasn’t the only Gulfstream Park-based horsemen to win five races on Saturday. Wesley Ward also turned the trick the same afternoon - at Woodbine. Four of those five winners were ridden by apprentice John Delgado.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Slew the Man and And Music Came will be making key surface changes Thursday for the ninth race at Oaklawn Park. Both horses will be getting back to dirt for the optional $50,000 claiming race at a mile, Slew the Man by way of the Tapeta surface at Golden Gate and And Music Came off a turf start at Sam Houston Race Park.
They are part of a nine-horse field for that one-mile race that is also open to allowance runners who have not won twice since Aug. 15.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Six races into his career, Silver Medallion will make his first start on a dirt surface in Saturday’s $1 million Santa Anita Derby.
Last weekend’s allowance race that came up as tough as a stakes turned out to be an almost perfect prep for the April 30 Grade 3 San Francisco Mile at Golden Gate Fields. The one-mile turf race had eight entrants – four locals and four from Southern California.
Hudson Landing won the race over the stakes winner Posse Power, with graded winner Awesome Gem in third.
“We’re surprised the race came up so tough,” said stakes coordinator David Jerkins. “It was a very competitive field.”
ARCADIA, Calif. – Times Gone By has been second and fourth in two one-mile turf races at Santa Anita this year, leaving trainer Richard Mandella alternating between a state of delight and confusion.
After finishing second in an optional claimer on Feb. 10, his first start since last May, Times Gone By was fourth as a 34-1 outsider in the Grade 1 Frank Kilroe Mile on March 5.
“I thought he’d run like he did the first time,” Mandella said of the Kilroe. “I was a little disappointed.”
Uncle Mo’s arrival in New York for Saturday's Wood Memorial will be delayed.
The Tex Sutton flight expected to bring Uncle Mo - and 19 other horses - from south Florida to New York on Tuesday was canceled due to weather issues. The flight has been rescheduled for Wednesday.
A 6,500-acre forest fire that swept through the town of Ruidoso Downs, N.M., on Sunday afternoon inflicted little damage to the racetrack Ruidoso Downs. The corner of one barn was burned as a result of the fire that roared adjacent to the track, according to a release issued by Ruidoso.
The fire grew as the result of high winds and dry conditions, and as of Monday afternoon it was not fully contained. The fire is currently burning east of Ruidoso Downs, but is not a threat to the track, according to the release issued Monday.
