ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Hooh Why outran a small but select group of fillies and mares Saturday at Woodbine in the seven-furlong, $161,500 Seaway Stakes.
Hooh Why, the winner of last year’s Grade 1 Ashland at Keeneland, battled up front with favored Tribal Belle, last year’s champion female sprinter in Canada, who set a wind-aided opening quarter of 22.86. Hooh Why got the half-mile split in 44.81, and then opened up a clear lead in the stretch en route to a 1 3/4-length tally in 1:23.51. She paid $15.50.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Bench Points won the $100,000 Graduation Stakes at Del Mar on Aug. 4, thanks in part to an excellent ride from jockey Rafael Bejarano.

It was Bejarano who guided Bench Points between horses in early stretch and went on to win by 2 3/4 lengths, earning the admiration of trainer Tim Yakteen. On Monday, Yakteen and Bejarano team together again when Bench Points starts in the $100,000 I’m Smokin Stakes for statebred 2-year-olds over six furlongs.

Yakteen is leaving race strategy to Bejarano, specifically how close to keep Bench Points to the lead.

AUBURN, Wash. – With Washington Cup Day and its six stakes less than a week away, there’s no added-money event on the holiday program Monday at Emerald Downs, though there’s some star power in the co-featured eighth and ninth races. The 10-race card begins at 2 p.m. Pacific.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – When Boys At Tosconova came into the stretch six lengths clear of his rivals in a July 2 maiden race at Belmont Park, trainer Richard Dutrow Jr. had a flashback.

“It was like when we watched Big Brown run for the first time for us,” said Dutrow, referring to the horse that won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness for him in 2008. “We were scared to death to run him that day, but when he turned for home our whole lives changed.”

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – The Pucker Up Stakes for 3-year-old turf fillies has found a nice niche in the 3-year-old filly turf division, producing the winner of the Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland three times since 2004. The Grade 3 Pucker Up, however, fell victim to early-summer Arlington stakes cuts, its purse reduced from $200,000 to $100,000.

Mike Farrell

OCEANPORT, N.J. – Sometimes it takes a while for a claim to pan out.

Richard Malouf and Eddie Broome won a 12-way shake to get Party to Party for $10,000 in April 2005 at Gulfstream Park. The mare never raced again, but the claim can’t be called a bust now that she is making her mark as a broodmare.

Partyallnightlong, her very quick son, makes his stakes debut Monday at Monmouth Park in the $100,000 Gilded Time Stakes for 3-year-old turf sprinters.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Gotta Have Her is a millionaire, a Grade 2 winner this year, and the defending champion of Monday’s $150,000 Palomar Handicap at Del Mar.

Lilly Fa Pootz won her first stakes here in July, finished in front of Gotta Have Her in the Grade 2 John Mabee Stakes on Aug. 15 and is in the best form of her career.

One of the two mares is likely to win the Grade 2 Palomar Handicap, which is run over 1 1/16 miles on turf and has drawn five fillies and mares.

Smitty’s Moonshine is a more accomplished horse on dirt at this point in his career, but there are reasons to believe he is better on turf and that theory will get tested Monday in the $150,000 A.L. “Red” Erwin at Louisiana Downs.

The one-mile turf race for 3-year-olds bred in Louisiana heads a card of four statebred stakes worth $400,000.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – In addition to Society’s Chairman in the Halton and Sand Cove in the Elgin, favorites could rule the roost in the other four $125,000 yearling sales stakes on Monday’s program.

Drunken Love, who is coming into the Kenora off a 6 1/2-length victory in Fort Erie’s Daryl Wells Sr. Memorial over five furlongs of dirt, looms the one to beat in the six-furlong Kenora for 3-year-olds and upward.

Mountaineer’s farewell to summer has the look of a summer rerun. Several of the same horses who played prominent roles in turf stakes on last month’s West Virginia Derby undercard will be back in action for the $75,000 turf stakes co-features that kick off Monday’s Labor Day card.

The mile-and-70-yard Labor Day, which goes as race 1, pits three of the five top runners from the West Virginia Speaker’s Cup, including winner Vanquisher and runner-up Timeless Fashion, who were separated by a half-length.