Local jockeys Joe Crispin, Mark Anderson, Javier Matias and Troy Stillwell will represent Portland Meadows against Team Southern California in the annual XpressBet Jockey Challenge on Monday, Nov. 29.
Representing Southern California in the four-race competition with $20,000 in prize money at stake will be Joel Rosario, David Flores, Joe Talamo, and Martin Pedroza.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Eddie Kenneally swept the two allowance races on the Sunday card at Churchill Downs, and he’s coming right back to try for something similar when he sends out major contenders in two of the three allowances that dot the Wednesday card.
Kenneally will saddle Isidora in the richest race of the day, the third, a $66,060 main-track mile, before securing the tack on Flask for a $63,620 sprint that goes as the ninth of 10 races. Julien Leparoux has both calls.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - The injured jockey Garrett Gomez returns to riding on a regular basis in Southern California on Sunday, and will ride Haimish Hy in the $250,000 Hollywood Derby that day.
The Grade 1 Hollywood Derby is run over 1 1/4 miles on turf and will be Haimish Hy’s first start at that level. Trained by Art Sherman, Haimish Hy has won 4 of 9 starts and $137,980.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – With regular rider Calvin Borel sidelined through the end of the year with the injury he sustained Saturday, Tony Farina will get the mount on Brass Hat for the Clark Handicap at Churchill Downs on Friday.
Borel sustained fractures to his lower jaw in a spill at Delta Downs and is expected to be out of action for at least five or six weeks. Borel incurred the injury when his mount in the $1 million Delta Jackpot, Aces N Kings, threw him approaching the quarter pole. Borel then was kicked by a trailing horse.
Michael Gill, a former leading owner, and a trainer he employed, Anthony Adamo, have filed a lawsuit accusing officials of Pennsylvania's racing commission of deprivation of their due process rights and other abuses related to their ejections from Penn National Race Course early this year.
The suit, filed on Nov. 11 in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, seeks monetary damages for the alleged abuses and the damage they have caused to the reputations of both Gill and Adamo, along with attorney’s costs.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Global Hunter, who suffered a severe ankle injury after winning the Grade 2 American Handicap at Hollywood Park last July, was recently released from the Alamo Pintado Equine Clinic in Los Olivos, Calif., and will stand the 2011 breeding season at Magali Farms in Santa Ynez, Calif.
Global Hunter will stand for $3,500, with the hope that he will be bred to approximately 30 mares, according to trainer A.C. Avila.
Global Hunter has been at Magali Farms since early November, and was inspected over the weekend by Dr. Doug Herthel of Alamo Pintado.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Ariana D and Ravalo, both of whom were making their first appearances at Woodbine, wound up in the spotlight in last weekend’s stakes features here at Woodbine Racetrack.
Ariana D, a 4-year-old who was bred in Pennsylvania by her owner, Bill Thompson Jr., was racing for Woodbine-based trainer Laurie Silvera for the first time when victorious by a neck in the $152,800 Bessarabian, a seven-furlong race for fillies and mares.
Divide the Cash and Good Reason SA finished one-two in the second and faster division of the Champion of Champions trials at Los Alamitos on Sunday, earning berths to the $750,000 final on Dec. 11.
In Sunday’s second and final division of the trials, formally known as the Z. Wayne Griffin Director’s trials, Divide the Cash ($15) ran 400 yards in 19.39 seconds, finishing a head in front of Good Reason SA, who was timed in19.41 seconds.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - It will be interesting to see how Turbulent Descent runs when she has to try. It has not happened yet.
She won a maiden special weight on Oct. 3 under a mild hand ride from jockey David Flores, who used the same style to guide Turbulent Descent to a convincing win in Sunday’s $100,000 Moccasin Stakes for 2-year-old fillies at Hollywood Park.
“She did it easy and in a soft way,” Flores said. “Right now, we’ll keep it as easy as we can.”
