OCEANPORT, N.J. – Trainers Scott Volk and Bruce Alexander felt good about their chances in the $100,000 Select Stakes for 3-year-olds on Sunday at Monmouth.
That was before they checked the entries, and saw the race got a whole lot tougher with the addition of Comedero.
A winner of 8 of 9, Comedero usually has his races wrapped up long before the finish wire. Comedero faces only four rivals in the six furlong race with
Robby Albarado aboard.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – The Travers Stakes picked up a new starter and, if you believe his connections, the horse to catch in the race, in the undefeated Trickmeister, a recent purchase made by Michael Iavarone’s IEAH Stables.
Trickmeister, a son of Proud Citizen previously owned by Brereton Jones and Timothy Thornton and trained by Cindy Jones, has won all three of his starts, including the $105,000 Barbaro Stakes at Delaware Park on July 10. He has set the pace in all three of his starts.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Timothy Snyder and his one-horse road show brought down the house Friday at Saratoga.
Lisa’s Booby Trap, the only horse in Snyder’s stable, rallied from last under Kent Desormeaux to dominate the $70,000 Loudonville Stakes by six lengths over Nonna Mia. Snyder had purchased Lisa’s Booby Trap privately during the winter for $4,500 from the breeder of the filly who thought she couldn’t run. By comparison, the other four runners in the Loudonville field sold for a combined $900,000 at auction.
DEL MAR, Calif . - Between the first-time starters Blazing Along and Star Presence, owner Kaleem Shah has invested more than $1 million in 2-year-old fillies starting in Sunday’s sixth race at Del Mar.
The two fillies, both trained by Bob Baffert, have worked together in recent weeks. They will start as a strongly backed entry on Sunday in a maiden race over 5 1/2 furlongs.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Two-year-olds get tested for class Sunday in the Grade 2 Best Pal Stakes at Del Mar.
“Now is when you find out who’s who, and who’s not,” Jeff Bonde said.
He trains Sway Away, among the most highly regarded juveniles in California but facing tougher in the Best Pal than the maidens he crushed first out at Pleasanton.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Big Drama’s first two forays into Grade 1 company were unsuccessful. His connections hope the third time is the charm when Big Drama seeks his first Grade 1 victory in Sunday’s $250,000 Alfred G. Vanderbilt Handicap at Saratoga.
Big Drama’s first Grade 1 attempt came in last year’s Preakness, where he finished fifth to Rachel Alexandra in a race where he got hot and bothered at the gate. The second try came in last year’s King’s Bishop here where here caught a sloppy main track and finished sixth of nine.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Joe Talamo will miss the remainder of the Del Mar meeting after suffering fractured bones in his left wrist in a one-horse spill on Thursday.
He is the second jockey among the top 10 at the meeting to be sidelined by injury for the rest of the meet. Jockey Tyler Baze suffered facial injuries in an incident at the starting gate on July 24, and like Talamo is expected to be sidelined until the start of the Oak Tree at Santa Anita meeting on Sept. 29.
VANCOUVER, British Columbia – According to trainer Dino Condilenios Burj Dubai has moved to the top of the list of the three horses he is pointing to the Grade 3, $250,000 Longacres Mile Aug. 22. Until recently, Teide was number one on the depth chart. Teide has been the top older horse at Hastings for the past two years, and last year he had a rough trip when he finished third in the Mile. Condilenios also nominated Almost Time to the Mile after he scored an impressive win in the B.C. Cup Sprint last Monday.
Five European-trained horses have been confirmed as starters by the International Racing Bureau for the Arlington Million on Aug. 21 at Arlington Park. They are currently headed by Summit Surge, recent winner of the Group 2 York Stakes, plus the third- and fourth-place finishers in the 1 1/4-mile, 88-yard contest, Allybar and Debussy.
Tim Glyshaw’s first exposure to horse racing came as a teenager at Ellis Park, adjacent to his hometown of Evansville, Ind.
A quarter-century later, after taking quite the circuitous route, Glyshaw is contending for leading trainer at the Henderson, Ky., track. A training title is something that Glyshaw, now 41, has never come close to attaining in the six years since he opened a public stable, so he is finding this life-comes-full-circle thing to be quite exciting.