HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - G G's Dolly is one of the quickest mares in the region. But her trainer, Kelly Von Hemel, does not want her to be the one with the target on her back Thursday, when she makes her first start since June in the featured eighth race at Oaklawn Park. He'd like that honor to fall to True Tails.
"I sure don't want to hook True Tails, but I sure don't want to let her get away," said Von Hemel. "You're going to have to be pretty close and hope you can run her down."
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Trainer Bob Holthus has won the Southwest Stakes a record five times, including the last two runnings with Lawyer Ron and Greater Good. Tuesday morning, he put his starter for this year's renewal, Grade 3 winner Officer Rocket, through a major work. The Southwest, which is worth $250,000, will open up Oaklawn Park's series for 3-year-olds on Feb. 19.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - In the case of Thursday's eighth race at Aqueduct, a six-furlong optional claimer with a $45,000 purse, the probable pace scenario seems pretty straightforward: Deep Dish Wildcat will try for the early lead, and her rivals will try to catch her.
Deep Dish Wildcat drew the inside post in a field of six 3-year-old fillies. The New Farm homebred makes her first start in New York following a third-place finish in the $74,000 Marshua Stakes at Laurel first time out this year.
BOYNTON BEACH, Fla. - While Street Sense, the winner of the Breeders' Cup Juvenile, is still weeks away from his first start of the year, the time is drawing closer for Dreaming of Anna, a fellow Eclipse Award champion and the winner of the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies. Dreaming of Anna, who like Street Sense is based this winter here at the Palm Meadows training center, is now scheduled to make her 2007 debut at Gulfstream Park on Feb. 10, trainer Wayne Catalano said Tuesday morning.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Three starts into her North American campaign, the Group 1-winning Brazilian import Naughty Rafaela already has used an array of excuses.
First, she had traffic trouble. Next time, she bounced. Then she moved too soon. One, two, three strikes and you're out.
However, Naughty Rafaela is not out. She keeps showing up, and promising more than she delivers. And though cynics have given up, Naughty Rafaela's supporters will give her one more chance Thursday in the $75,000 La Zanzara Handicap at Santa Anita.
A couple days after the 3-year-old filly Total aced her stakes debut, winning the Jan. 1 Letellier Memorial by more than six lengths, her trainer, Al Stall, remarked on how unexceptional Total's morning workouts generally appeared. That changed last Saturday. In her major breeze for the Feb. 10 Silverbulletday Stakes, Total finally put up a glittering work time, five furlongs in 59.40 seconds, the fastest of 51 works at the distance that morning.
ALBANY, Calif. - To the victors go the laughs, bragging rights, and stories.
So Dan Jelladian could laugh about the so-called lack of respect that Bwana Bull, who won Sunday's California Derby, received in Las Vegas last week.
Jelladian, a part owner of Bwana Bull, said the colt was 250-1 in Kentucky Derby futures betting at a Strip casino, but that when he attempted to bet $4,000, he was rebuffed.
"I could have made a million dollars," he said.
Russell Baze, the world's winningest jockey, is expected to miss one week after suffering an undisplaced cracked left seventh rib in a four-horse spill Sunday.
The accident happened one race before Baze was to ride Bwana Bull in the California Derby, and prevented him from riding the horse, who won.
American Ivy fractured a cannon bone and fell near the three-eighths pole, causing a chain reaction. She fell into Kendrick's Patsy, who then caused Baze's mount, Ivy League Genius, to fall. Claire Simoff also fell over American Ivy, who had to be euthanized on the track.
The undefeated Hard Spun will remain at his Oaklawn Park base for the track's series of stakes for 3-year-olds, beginning with the $250,000 Southwest on Feb. 19.
"Right now, we're planning on the whole campaign right here," said Larry Jones, who trains Hard Spun for Rick Porter.
Hard Spun won the Grade 3, $100,000 Lecomte at Fair Grounds in his two-turn debut last out and had been considered for the Grade 3, $300,000 Risen Star there Feb. 10. By staying home, he will not have to make the 10-hour van ride to New Orleans from Hot Springs, Ark., said Jones.