HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Ginger Punch's odds just dropped. The champion will be an even stronger favorite Saturday in the Grade 1, $500,000 Apple Blossom Handicap at Oaklawn Park with the Monday defection of one of her chief rivals, Hystericalady.
By STEVE ANDERSEN
ARCADIA, Calif. Mondays eight-race program at Santa Anita features a pick six carryover of $182,385. There were no winning favorites in Sundays pick six.
In addition, there is a carryover of $99,757 in the $1 Super High Five, a wager that requires bettors to correctly select the first five finishers of the final race.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - For Robby Albarado, the stretch run of the Dubai World Cup unfolded in "a blur." His words. Sure, there was no doubt he had won. And it's not like the final quarter-mile of the world's richest horse race provided release for frayed nerves. Albarado came into Saturday's night's racing all smiles, and he never turned a hair. It was just that with the roar of a huge crowd on a desert night, the feeling of sitting astride the best horse this year, last year, and perhaps in many a year - it was hard to separate specific occurrences.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - Unspoken Word took over on the backstretch and gamely held on to the lead, repelling the late charge of Wild Promises to win the $61,070 Hillsborough Handicap by a head at Bay Meadows on Saturday.
"I didn't figure Anamanor to go early when she bolted to the lead," winning jockey Russell Baze said. "It worked out all right because my filly relaxed behind her on the turn. Down the backstretch she just dragged me to the lead, but once she got in front, she relaxed again.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Niagara Causeway's career has been revitalized on Santa Anita's synthetic main track. After winning just two of his first 18 starts, racing mostly on turf, Niagara Causeway has won two consecutive starts on a synthetic surface, including his first stakes win in the $108,200 Tokyo City Handicap on Saturday.
Niagara Causeway ($20.80) won the Grade 3 Tokyo City Handicap by a nose over Church Service, giving trainer Leonard Powell, 31, his first stakes win in California.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Big Brown completed the remarkable jump from virtual anonymity to the likely Kentucky Derby favorite in a period of less than four weeks after posting an eye-catching five-length victory over Smooth Air and 10 other overmatched rivals in Saturday's $1 million Florida Derby. The triumph also completed a dream day for trainer Rick Dutrow, who earlier won two rich stakes on the Dubai World Cup card with Diamond Stripes and Benny the Bull.
Only five horses went to the gate in the $62,200 Harrison E. Johnson Memorial at Laurel Park, but it took a photo to separate two of them at the finish as Arcata bobbed his head at the right time to nose out a persistent Eddie C. in the 1 1/8-mile race.
Save a spot on the Kentucky Derby trail for Salute the Sarge.
Saturday at Santa Anita, Salute the Sarge made a successful 3-year-old debut in the $78,000 San Miguel Stakes over six furlongs, a race that trainer Eric Guillot says was a prep for the $325,000 Lexington Stakes at Keeneland on April 19.
