LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Bob Baffert and Silverbulletday both were elected to the Racing Hall of Fame earlier this week. Ten years after winning the Kentucky Oaks with Silverbulletday, Baffert is back at Churchill Downs with a filly he said compares favorably.
"Indian Blessing is a lot like Silverbulletday," Baffert said shortly after Indian Blessing breezed five furlongs Wednesday morning at Churchill in a bullet 59.40 seconds. "She's an amazing animal."
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Trainer David Bell's barn is off to a quick start here at Woodbine, with two wins and five other in-the-money finishes from 10 starters.
Saturday, Bell will be looking to ring up his first stakes win of the season when Shadowless runs in the $150,000 Jacques Cartier, a six-furlong race for 4-year-olds and upward.
Shadowless, a 4-year-old gelding, was on the improve through the closing stages of his 3-year-old campaign and closed out with an upset win over older rivals in the Grade 3 Kennedy Road at six furlongs.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - The way that Compari stormed down the stretch in a maiden race at Santa Anita on March 29, his connections figure a start in Saturday's $250,000 Snow Chief Stakes is a gamble worth taking.
The Snow Chief Stakes for 3-year-old statebreds will be Compari's first stakes appearance in his third career start. Owned by breeders John Harris, John Nicoletti, and Don Valpredo, and trained by Marty Jones, Compari will face a stern test.
Jamie Ness, the leading trainer at Tampa Bay Downs, will be allowed to start horses while state investigators test substances confiscated from his barn during a search on Tuesday, an official of Tampa Bay said on Wednesday.
Margo Flynn, a spokeswoman for the track, said that security guards will be posted in Ness s barn as the investigation related to the search proceeds.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - While his primary focus is preparing Desert Party and Regal Ransom for the Kentucky Derby, Rick Mettee is also busy these days setting up the rest of Godolphin Racing's North American string.
A dozen Godolphin horses - including 2-year-old champion Midshipman and the multiple Grade 1 winner Vineyard Haven - cleared quarantine last weekend and are bedded down in Barn 4 at Belmont Park. Other Godolphin horses stabled here include Godolphin Mile one-two finishers Two Step Salsa and Gayego and the graded turf stakes winner Tam Lin.
Rodeo's Castle, now 8, has been turning up on the work tab at Will Rogers Downs in Claremore, Okla. He is scheduled to make his first start of the year at the track in the $50,000 Route 66 on May 2, said his trainer, Veronica Griggs. The race will be the first start since last June for Rodeo's Castle, a three-time stakes winner who has earned $414,766.
"We had a five-eighths work today, and he worked very well," Griggs said Wednesday, noting she caught the horse in 1:02. "He came back bouncing from the work, so he seems back real close to his old self. I'm pretty excited."
Sam Houston Race Park in Houston will have an expanded stakes schedule for its Quarter Horse meet that opens May 1, because it is picking up dates for Retama Park near San Antonio in a one-year agreement made last summer. A total of 41 stakes will be run during the 54-date meet at Sam Houston. The season will continue through Aug. 29.
The Grade 1 Sam Houston Futurity on Aug. 28 will again highlight the stakes schedule. Last year, the race was worth $335,200. Trials for the Sam Houston Futurity, at 400 yards, are Aug. 13.
It has been unseasonably cool in the High Desert region of New Mexico this spring but jockey Isaias Enriquez did his part to warm things up on SunRay's opening weekend with a couple of big days in the saddle.
Enriquez accounted for four of the six Thoroughbred races on opening day and added another three wins on Saturday to bolt out to an early lead in the rider standings. Enriquez had riding commitments at Sunland Park on Sunday, when he settled for a couple of runner-up performances and a third-place finish in the $100,000 Sunland Park Handicap on board Quiet Again.
Heavy rain that forced the cancellation of last Saturday's card after one race resulted in the John Henry Stakes - scheduled to be the first stakes over Evangeline's new turf course - being scrapped, but the race will be rescheduled, according to the track's racing secretary, Coleman Lloyd.
"The John Henry will definitely be brought back," Lloyd said. "We just are not sure when. I know it won't be this weekend but [Kentucky] Derby Day is a strong possibility. I will let horsemen know just as soon as we make a final decision."
The much-anticipated rematch of The Nutz and Wayzata Bay in Saturday's $75,000 Bosselman/Gus Fonner Stakes apparently is off, as trainer Judi Hicklin notified the Fonner Park racing office that she no longer intended to enter Wayzata Bay. The Nutz defeated Wayzata Bay by a length in last year's Bosselman. Wayzata Bay went on to win the Grade 2 Prairie Meadows Cornhusker Handicap, then was third in the Grade 3 Hawthorne Gold Cup in September.
