ETOBICOKE, Ontario - The 32nd annual Sovereign Awards ceremony, honoring the best in Canadian Thoroughbred racing and breeding, will take place Saturday evening at the InterContinental Toronto Centre.
A total of 20 awards will be presented and the festivities will climax with the announcement of the three finalists and winner of the Horse of the Year award for 2006.
The three finalists in 15 other categories were announced on Dec. 7 by the Jockey Club of Canada.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Slot machines won't be the only new additions awaiting fans and horsemen when racing returns to Gulfstream Park for the 2007 season beginning on Jan. 3.
In response to concerns raised by patrons and trainers during the 2006 race meet, the first conducted with the newly constructed Gulfstream Park grandstand, track management has renovated several areas of the facility, including the paddock, winner's circle, and the north park area of the grandstand.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - Moonlite Romance and Bank Emblem bring the biggest bankrolls into Saturday's Bay Meadows feature, a first-level allowance race at six furlongs.
But Moonlite Romance might be considered an underachiever, while Bank Emblem is something of an overachiever.
Both are 3-year-olds, and both started in the claiming ranks.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - In gymnastics, 10 is a perfect score. In the Grade 1 Hollywood Futurity on Saturday at Hollywood Park, 10 is the outside post, the one drawn by the likely favorite, the unbeaten Belgravia. To keep his record perfect, Belgravia will have to perform some gymnastics. He must overcome the outside post, the short run to the first turn in the 1 1/16-mile race, nine rivals eager to knock him off, and the possibility of rain.
The New England Turf Writers will present 17 awards next summer to the region's top horses and horsemen of 2006, and will recognize two of the circuit's adopted favorite sons. The turf writers has announced the winners in each category, except for horse of the year.
Jockey Jerri Nichols was killed in a car accident on Interstate-10 near Lake Charles, La., on Wednesday night, Bobby Granger, agent for her husband, jockey Kirk LeBlanc, confirmed. LeBlanc was in the car with Nichols, but escaped serious injury, was released from a local hospital and went home with family, said Granger.
LeBlanc had seven mounts on Wednesday nights card at Delta Downs, the Vinton, La., track that is located near Lake Charles.
Nichols and LeBlanc were married three years ago. Both have long been based in Louisiana.
Fresh off becoming the first New Mexico-bred Thoroughbred to earn $1 million, Rocky Gulch is back at his home base of Sunland Park and is expected to start in a handful of races at the meet. His first stakes engagement is Saturday, when he takes on a competitive group of New Mexico-breds in the $125,000 Johnie L. Jamison.
Rocky Gulch went over the $1 million mark in earnings on the New Mexico Cup program last month at Zia Park, when he won the $212,000 Classic. He has spent much of his time at Sunland, where he has won 7 of 16 starts and $617,853.
In years past, when Bobby Frankel started a horse at Fair Grounds, it required a plane trip from a distant racetrack. Now, Frankel horses can walk over from their own stall on the Fair Grounds backstretch.
Not that the Frankel contingent at Fair Grounds is his A Team, but even a group of Frankel backups can lend some backbone to a racing program. At worst, Frankel has high-priced claiming horses, and from the horses he's entered at the meet so far, he appears to have mostly allowance and listed stakes-type runners for the season.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Owner Tom Stull is taking a gamble by supplementing the multiple turf stakes winner Whatsthescript to Saturday's Hollywood Futurity on the synthetic track.
Whatsthescript would be a short-priced favorite in the $75,000 Eddie Logan Stakes over a mile on turf at Santa Anita on Dec. 30, and will be a longer price in Saturday's Grade 1 Futurity over 1 1/16 miles.
Stull and trainer Manuel Marques debated which race to try before deciding on the Futurity on Wednesday, Marques said.
