Multiple 2009 Eclipse Award winner Gio Ponti will be cross-entered in both the Breeders’ Cup Classic and the Breeders’ Cup Mile when Breeders’ Cup pre-entries are taken on Monday, according to a manager at the Castleton-Lyons Farm of Gio Ponti’s owner, Shane Ryan.
“At the moment our intention is to enter in both the races,” Stuart Fitzgibbon, commercial manager at Castleton-Lyons, said Thursday afternoon.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – In years when the University of Kentucky hosts Georgia for a night football game during the Keeneland fall meet, thousands of curiosity-seeking Georgia fans typically turn out for an afternoon of horse racing. Uninitiated in the subtleties of handicapping, those novices surely will be bumfuzzled when they come upon the Raven Run Stakes here Saturday.
They won’t be alone.
OCEANPORT, N.J. – A small step can lead to a giant jackpot. The $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot, to be precise.
That is the route trainer Kelly Breen has mapped for Sweet Ducky, assuming all goes well in the $70,000 Seton Hall University Stakes for 2-year-olds on Saturday at Monmouth Park.
Sweet Ducky will be making his fourth start, all at Monmouth. The colt with the unusual name faces five rivals in the one-mile race.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Queen’s Plate winner Big Red Mike, who finished sixth when returning from a two-month absence in the Ontario Derby, has been entered in Saturday’s Autumn Stakes prep for 3-year-olds and upward but also was nominated for Sunday’s $100,000 Mobil, an overnight stakes for Ontario-foaled 3-year-olds.
The Autumn Stakes prep is a 1 1/16-mile Polytrack race, and the Mobil is at 1 1/8 miles on turf. Big Red Mike has never run on turf.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Wyomia, who is coming off an impressive win in the Grade 3 Mazarine over 1 1/16 miles on the main track here Oct. 9, is headed for the Breeders’ Cup at Churchill Downs. But while trainer Danny Vella originally had considered pointing Wyomia for the Juvenile Fillies at 1 1/16 miles on the dirt, he now plans to pre-enter her in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf.
PHOENIX – Trainer Robertino Diodoro looks to double his pleasure at Turf Paradise Saturday when he sends out prime contenders in the two stakes at the Phoenix track: Waltzing With Blue in the $35,000 Walter R. Cluer Memorial, a mile turf race for 3-year-olds and upward, and Rule the Storm in the $35,000 Queen of the Green Handicap for fillies and mares at a mile on the turf.
The Queen of the Green goes as race 6; the Walter Cluer is race 8.
ALBANY, Calif. – Trainer Bud Klokstad won’t admit to high expectations for Summer Excess, a 3-year-old who is making his stakes debut in Saturday’s $50,000 Oakland Handicap at Golden Gate Fields. But just the fact he has entered the gelding in this six-furlong stakes for 3-year-olds and up tells you something. Summer Excess faces five rivals, four of whom are stakes winners.
Tiz Miz Sue remained undefeated in three starts over Delaware Park’s main track by scoring a 4 ¼-length victory in Wednesday’s $50,350 Polly’s Jet Stakes for 3-year-old fillies.
Making her first start since winning a second-level optional claimer on Aug. 26, Tiz Miz Sue ($15.20) ran 1 1/16 miles on a wet-fast track in 1:44.05, giving leading jockey Anna Napravnik the 995th victory of her career.
Trained by Steve Hobby, Tiz Miz Sue has now won 4 of 13 overall. Her previous best finish in a stakes was second in the Grade 3 Arlington-Washington Lassie 13 months ago.