John E. Mooney, the executive director of racing at Delaware Park, will retire as of Aug. 1 after a 40-year career as a racing official at tracks across the mid-Atlantic, the track has announced.

Mooney first came to work at Delaware as the track’s general manager in 1984 and later served stints in management at the Maryland Jockey Club and as an executive with a group that sought to establish a racetrack in Virginia, an effort that led to the opening of Colonial Downs. Mooney returned to Delaware Park in 2008 as the track’s executive director of racing.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - The farrier Ray Amato Sr., a member of the International Horseshoeing Hall of Fame, died Monday at his home in Florida due to cancer. He was 88.

Amato began working as a farrier in 1949 at Aqueduct. His roster of clients included many of the legendary horsemen of the turf including Hirsch Jacobs, Bobby Frankel, Laz Barrera, Frank “Pancho” Martin, and Todd Pletcher.

Lone Star Park in Grand Prairie, Texas, opened its 25th anniversary season with a great deal of expectation in April, but a subsequent impasse between the Texas Racing Commission and Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority that restricted the export of its signal in July led to a decline in handle over the corresponding meet in 2021.  

DEL MAR, Calif. – Country Grammer, winner of the Dubai World Cup in his last start, has been assigned top weight of 125 pounds for the Grade 2, $300,000 San Diego Handicap on Saturday at Del Mar.

The San Diego, at 1 1/16 miles, is a prep for the biggest race of the meet, the $1 million Pacific Classic at 1 1/4 miles – the World Cup distance – on Sept. 3.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainers are creatures of habit and Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen is no different. Thus, despite a deluge of rain accompanied by a few rumbles of thunder and the occasional flash of lightning, Asmussen sent Epicenter out early Monday morning for his final work before Saturday’s Grade 2, $600,000 Jim Dandy Stakes.

Hot Rod Charlie breezed six furlongs in 1:12.40 Monday morning at Keeneland, his last serious move before he runs in the Grade 1, $1 million Whitney Stakes at Saratoga on Aug. 6.

It was the fourth work for Hot Rod Charlie -- all at Keeneland -- since he was beaten a head by Mind Control in the Salvator Mile at Monmouth Park on June 18.

Trainer Doug O’Neill, reached at Del Mar Monday morning, said he saw a video of the work and liked what he saw.

DEL MAR, Calif. – What a difference a change of scenery has made on the Southern California circuit, where Del Mar posted sensational business figures during its abbreviated three-day opening weekend.

Led by an opening-day handle figure of $23.56 million on Friday, Del Mar averaged $22.35 million in handle for the first three days, which the track reported as both being records.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Dr. Schivel, winner of the Grade 1 Bing Crosby Stakes at Del Mar last summer and third in the Group 1 Golden Shaheen Sprint in Dubai in March, has been turned out until the autumn.

Trainer Mark Glatt said Sunday that Dr. Schivel has been sent to a local farm and will remain there until the first of October. The hope of a start in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint on Nov. 5 at Keeneland has been abandoned.

“To work through what he needed to get through, to have a legitimate shot at the Breeders’ Cup would be pushing it,” Glatt said.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Todd Pletcher said Monday all was well with Malathaat the morning after her disappointing second-place finish to Clairiere as the 3-5 favorite in Sunday’s 2 Grade 2 Shuvee.

“She came back good, seemed just fine this morning,” Pletcher noted. “I don’t know why she was so quiet yesterday. She was very lethargic in the paddock. The only thing I can think of was the heat. It just wasn’t like her. She’s not high strung or animated necessarily, but she was dull."

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Olympiad, who has won four graded stakes this year as part of a 5-for-5 campaign, worked a strong five furlongs in 1:00.86 over Saratoga's Oklahoma training track Sunday morning in preparation for the Grade 1, $1 million Whitney Stakes here on Aug. 6.

Olympiad, under exercise rider Neil Poznansky, started about 1 1/2 lengths in front of Gilded Age, and basically maintained that margin throughout the work in which he got his last quarter in 23.56 seconds.