INGLEWOOD, Calif. – The $200,000 Swaps Stakes at Hollywood Park on Saturday lost another stakes-winning contender Wednesday when trainer Bob Baffert opted to pass the race with Concord Point, winner of the Grade 3 Iowa Derby last month.
Earlier in the week, trainer Ron Ellis said that Golden Itiz, winner of the Grade 3 Affirmed Handicap at Hollywood Park on June 19, would skip the race.
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas – Jockey Aaron Gryder is taking the overland route to his next base, Remington Park, after the close of the current Lone Star Park meet Sunday. He could spend a little time riding in Southern California and France before he gets settled in at Remington, the Oklahoma City track that won’t begin its meet until Aug. 19.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – When General Quarters won the 2009 Blue Grass Stakes and went on to the Kentucky Derby, the story-line screamed, ‘Write me!’ And any scribe covering last year’s Derby readily obliged. The horse had been claimed early in his 2-year-old campaign by Tom McCarthy, a retired school teacher with half a foot in the racing business. McCarthy owned the horse and trained him too – the sort of one-horse stable that quickly fills a turf writer’s notebook.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – Tuscan Evening, the pro tem leader of the North American female turf division, worked seven furlongs in 1:27.40 on Wednesday at Hollywood Park and remains on track to make her next start July 17 at Arlington in the Modesty Handicap, trainer Jerry Hollendorfer said Thursday.
“She’ll likely blow out a little bit on Tuesday, and she ships on Wednesday,” Hollendorfer said.
Bubbler, who in the last six months has won stakes at Fair Grounds, Lone Star Park and Sam Houston, has been retired, said her trainer, Bret Calhoun. She recently injured her hock while being freshened on a farm. Calhoun said plans are to offer Bubbler as a broodmare prospect in a November auction in Kentucky.
“She was a fun filly,” said Calhoun, who trained Bubbler for Du-Zee Stables. “She was very, very consistent. She won going short, long, on dirt, turf. She was very talented.”
FORT ERIE, Ontario – Chris Griffith has been climbing aboard Thoroughbreds at Fort Erie for more than 20 years and the laid-back rider is nearing career win number 1,400.
Griffith, 40, had 1,377 wins entering Sunday’s card. He has won the Fort Erie riding title three times and is currently second in the standings with 22 wins, 10 behind leading rider Krista Carignan.
The soft-spoken, relaxed, and reliable Griffith is happy with the results.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – For the next 10 days, the focus of the final weekend of Hollywood Park and the opening day at Del Mar is on 3-year-olds – the established main-track stars and the up-and-coming hopefuls on turf.
Hollywood Park concludes its spring-summer meeting this Sunday, and the most lucrative race of the final weekend is Saturday’s $200,000 Swaps Stakes for 3-year-olds over 1 1/8 miles on the synthetic main track.
Ankle problem sidelines Drosselmeyer
By David Grening
Belmont Stakes winner Drosselmeyer could be sidelined the remainder of the year due to ankle issues that have prompted his connections to take him out of training, trainer Bill Mott said Sunday.
Drosselmeyer, who as of Sunday was stabled in Saratoga, was expected to ship to WinStar Farm in Kentucky as early as Monday and will likely undergo a bone scan this week, Mott said. WinStar, the operation headed by Bill Casner and Ken Troutt, own Drosselmeyer.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Free Fee Lady wasn’t given much of a chance in Sunday’s $250,000 Bison City as she was sent away at 15-1 in a field of just four Canadian-bred 3-year-old fillies.
But when the mist had cleared it was Free Fee Lady, making her stakes debut and first start around two turns for owner Dick Bonnycastle and trainer Reade Baker, who emerged a four-length winner with jockey Emma-Jayne Wilson in the irons for the first time.