Beulah Park cancelled racing Friday due to adverse weather conditions. Heavy rain overnight in the Columbus area and warming tempatures caused the track to be covered with water and thawing out. Racing is expected to resumse on Saturday, closing day.
Rosemary Homeister Jr. notched her 2,000th career victory Thursday at Tampa Bay Downs when she rode Rustyshouldrun ($8.40) to a 1 1/4-length win in the seventh race.
Homeister, 35, who began her career in south Florida in 1992, has had nearly 15,000 mounts, which have earned a total of more than $34,482,000 in purses.
Remington Park in Oklahoma City is the latest track to report a decline in average daily handle in an economy that has challenged racing. Purses, however, were up at Remington, which operates a slots casino. The track's 67-date meet closed Sunday.
The return of the Grade 2 San Francisco Mile highlights the winter-spring stakes schedule at Golden Gate Fields in Albany, Calif. The meet begins next Friday and runs through June 14, 2009.
The San Francisco Mile was not run last year because the now-closed Bay Meadows had the bulk of the spring dates in Northern California, and there was no opportunity to run it at Golden Gate. The race will return on April 25 with a $300,000 purse, the richest of the 18 stakes at the meeting.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Nearly eight months after her last start, Tiz a Blend makes her comeback in Saturday's $75,000 Cat's Cradle Handicap at Hollywood Park. How ready she is to return in a race going 7 1/2 furlongs is another matter.
The race is more than a sprint, but not quite a route. "You've got to train it as a mile race," trainer Carla Gaines said. "To say she's dead set and ready, that's a bit of a question."
The surface is also an issue. Owned by Warren Williamson, Tiz a Blend has won 3 of 11 starts, but is winless in four starts on synthetic main tracks.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Before Azul Leon ever ran this past spring, the word was out that he was one of the most precocious 2-year-olds on the circuit. And though he could not handle the likes of Midshipman and Street Hero in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and Norfolk Stakes this fall, he has had a productive first season, one that trainer Doug O'Neill hopes ends on an up note on Saturday in the Grade 1, $750,000 CashCall Futurity at Hollywood Park.
Peppers Pride is not the only one who has been perfect throughout her historic 19-race career. Jockey Carlos Madeira has been aboard for every one of those wins in a partnership that was formed when she made her career debut at Ruidoso Downs in July 2005.
A promising 2-year-old by the sire Proud Citizen, owned by Brereton Jones, and wintering at Fair Grounds with trainer Larry Jones. Ring any bells? It should, for those were the circumstances that one year ago described Proud Spell, who has a good chance to win an Eclipse award as the top 3-year-old filly of 2008. But they also apply to It Happened Again, who races Saturday at Fair Grounds in a strikingly deep edition of the Sugar Bowl Stakes.
The 11th running of the Claiming Crown has been set for July 25, 2009, officials at Canterbury Park in Shakopee, Minn., said Wednesday. Purses and conditions for the seven-race, $600,000 series will be identical to those in 2008. The richest race, the $150,000 Claiming Crown Jewel, will be for horses who have started for a claiming price of $35,000 or less since Jan. 1, 2008.
This will be the ninth time Canterbury has hosted the Crown. It was held at Philadelphia Park in 2002 and Ellis Park in 2006.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - The clock is ticking on Hollywood Park, but how fast? Its current owner, Stockbridge Real Estate Funds, has said it will develop the property, and a report this week in the Los Angeles Business Journal said that process would begin Aug. 1 of next year.
However, no timetable has been given to the current operators of the racetrack, according to Jack Liebau, the president of Hollywood Park, and Eual Wyatt Jr., the track's vice president and general manager.
