OZONE PARK, N.Y. - After taking the weekend stakes with Heart Butte and Quiet Giant, trainer Todd Pletcher’s stable will seek some more stakes success with Driven by Success in Friday’s $60,000 Mr. International Stakes for New York-breds and Calibrachoa in Saturday’s Grade 3, $100,000 Toboggan.
OZONE PARK, N.Y – Trainer Richard Dutrow Jr. already has a solid group of 3-year-olds stabled at Gulfstream Park. Another one will soon be on the way.
Flashpoint, on the basis of a scintillating 6 1/4-length debut victory at Aqueduct on Saturday, will soon be headed to south Florida, where he will be pointed to the Grade 2, $150,000 Hutcheson Stakes at seven furlongs on Feb. 26.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - A field of eight is shaping up for the $500,000 Sunshine Millions Classic, the richest of the three Sunshine Millions races to be run here on Jan. 29. The others are the $300,000 Filly and Mare Turf and the $200,000 Filly and Mare Sprint.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Business is booming at Gulfstream Park. Through the first two weeks of the meet, ontrack handle is up 26 percent, all-sources handle is up 21 percent, and attendance is up more than 50 percent over corresponding figures from a year ago. Sunday alone showed a whopping 75 percent increase in all-sources handle over the same date in 2010, when rain forced the races to be taken off the turf.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Tapizar’s win in the Grade 3 Sham Stakes at Santa Anita on Saturday confirmed trainer Steve Asmussen’s belief that the colt will play an important role in the build-up to the Kentucky Derby.
Tapizar won his stakes debut in the Sham, disputing the pace through the first quarter-mile before taking the lead and winning by 4 1/4 lengths in a quick 1:40.38 for 1 1/16 miles. Tapizar earned a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 97 in the Sham, which was preceded by an emphatic win by 10 1/2 lengths against maidens at Churchill Downs on Nov. 27.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – It will take a little quality and a lot of stamina to win Wednesday’s featured eighth race at Gulfstream Park, a 1 1/2-mile, entry-level allowance test over the inner turf course that carries a $51,000 purse.
OLDSMAR, Fla. – Manicero and Devilish Lady both passed their first tests as 3-year-olds on Saturday at Tampa Bay Downs. Manicero won the Pasco Stakes and Devilish Lady the Gasparilla Stakes, and now both look to the future.
Manicero,who won the Inaugural Stakes here in his final start at 2, proved that win was no fluke with a half-length win over Bert B Don in the Pasco as the two south Florida invaders duplicated their Inaugural finish. Leo Azpurua Jr., who trains Manicero for his father Leo Sr., said Sunday that Manicaro came out of the Pasco in good shape.
ARCADIA, Calif.- Always a Princess upset Blind Luck in Sunday’s $150,000 El Encino Stakes at Santa Anita, taking advantage of a track that favors speed in two-turn races to win by 3 1/2 lengths.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Win Willy launched what his connections hope will be a big Oaklawn Park meet on Sunday, when he overcame a controlled pace to win the $75,000 Fifth Season by a neck over Stachys. It was another half-length back in third to Kate’s Main Man.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla.- Adirondack Summer nipped Brilliant Speed by a nose to capture Sunday’s $100,000 Dania Beach Stakes at Gulfstream Park.
Rallying from last at the head of the stretch under jockey Alan Garcia, Adirondack Summer ($11) finished full of run on the extreme outside to win his stakes debut for owner Peter Deutsch and trainer Christophe Clement. Master Dunker finished another 1 1/4 lengths farther back in third.
