Trainer Mike Natale received a $500 fine and a 15-day suspension after one of his horses tested positive for an antihistamine known as tripelennamine at Prairie Meadows. The horse, Frozen Angel, was disqualified from his second-place finish in the eighth race on May 3, and the purse ordered forfeited.
Tripelennamine is classified as a Class 3 substance, one that may have generally accepted medical use, but that has potential to affect performance.
Natale denied using the substance on the horse.
Trainer Bob Schultz hopes to be doing some significant business over the Louisiana Downs turf course in the next few months. Lee's Spirit, who won the track's $50,000 Barksdale with a late burst Saturday, has two more local stakes objectives on his calendar, while quality 2-year-old filly Dixieland Bull is set to try two turns for the first time in an upcoming turf stakes at Louisiana Downs.
Goosey Moose will miss the $75,000 Assault at Lone Star Park on Saturday for the first time in six years, but his trainer, Danny Pish, hopes he can make the 2011 running. The race is the main event on the annual Stars of Texas Day program each July.
Goosey Moose has won the Assault four times, starting with his first appearance in the race, in 2004. His most recent score came last year, at the age of 8. Goosey Moose seemed on his way to another Assault appearance until this past winter, when he sustained a ligament injury in a workout at Sam Houston.
Alameda County Fair CEO Rick Pickering took one for the team when he, somewhat reluctantly, requested and received permission from the California Horse Racing Board last Friday to cancel racing on Wednesday, July 7.
"We could have pushed to run that day," he said, "but the Alameda County Fair is about being a good partner to racing, and this decision was made in the best interest of racing. It will help us have stronger cards the rest of the week and can help other fairs during this time when we have a low inventory of horses."
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - For more than a decade, the acquisition of high-priced claimers helped trainer Mike Mitchell win some of the biggest races of his career.
Ever a Friend, claimed for $62,500 in December 2007, won the Grade 1 Frank Kilroe Mile the following March. Church Service, claimed for $50,000 in January 2008, won the Grade 3 Dallas Turf Cup in May of that year. On the Acorn, taken for $40,000 in November 2006, later won three graded stakes, including the Grade 2 Jim Murray Handicap in 2007 and 2008.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Due to excessive heat, Belmont Park has canceled its scheduled nine-race live racing program for Wednesday.
The facility will be open for simulcasting, and NYRA Rewards telebet and Internet wagering will be available.
A heat wave has broiled the New York metropolitan area since Sunday, and 100-degree temperatures were expected to continue through mid-week before moderating.
LOS ALAMITOS, Calif. - Blane Schvaneveldt, the winningest trainer in Los Alamitos history and the champion Quarter Horse trainer in the nation 12 times, has died of complications from a heart arrhythmia, his family announced Monday.
Schvaneveldt was hospitalized last Friday after showing signs of distress while having breakfast in the track kitchen. Subsequent medical tests at Los Alamitos Medical Center revealed that Schvaneveldt had limited brain activity. He was taken off life support Sunday afternoon.
Schvaneveldt was 76.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - J P's Gusto won his second stakes of the Hollywood Park spring-summer meeting in Monday's $100,000 Hollywood Juvenile Championship, but this win was not as easy as his victory in the Willard Proctor Memorial Stakes in May.
J P's Gusto won the Proctor by 4 1/2 lengths. He won the Grade 3 Juvenile Championship for 2-year-olds by a hard-fought neck over Western Mood, who was head-and-head with the winner at one point in the final furlong. Ridden by Joe Talamo, J P's Gusto ($3.40) ran six furlongs in 1:10.48.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Cornelio Velasquez attempted to get Rightly So off the pace in Monday's Grade 3 at Belmont Park. But the 4-year-old filly wanted no part of it.
Smart filly.
Combining her strongest weapons - her natural speed and her tenacity - Rightly So scored a front-running, head victory over even-money favorite Qualia in the $150,000 Bed o' Roses. It was 3 1/4 lengths back to McVictory in third.
"I didn't send her," Velasquez said. "I tried to get her back, but she ran off and I let her go."
