MIAMI - Trainer Christophe Clement has won the Grade 2 W.L. McKnight and La Prevoyante handicaps a combined five times, and odds are pretty good that he'll add to that total Saturday, when he sends out the starting highweight and likely favorite in both races.
The McKnight and La Prevoyante both carry $200,000 purses and highlight Saturday's Grand Slam II program, which also includes the $100,000 Kenny Noe Jr. and Fred. W. Hooper handicaps, both Grade 3 events.
The last time Shmooo raced, he was a 3-year-old running in a stakes on Kentucky Derby Day. It has taken 19 months for Shmooo to recover sufficiently from ankle surgery to race again.
Based on his previous flashes of talent and trainer Tony Dutrow's knack for having his runners ready to win first time back following lengthy layoffs, Shmooo looms a serious contender in Friday's eighth race at Aqueduct, a $45,000 first-level allowance at six furlongs.
Zia Park made a significant effort to increase the distribution of its signal during its 2006 meet, and the move paid off as the track reported that average daily handle on its races nearly doubled from its inaugural season in 2005.
During its 49-date mixed meet for Thoroughbreds and Quarter Horses that ended Tuesday, Zia handled an average $424,109 a day on its races from all sources this meet, an increase of 85 percent from the $229,397 bet daily on Zia races last year. Ontrack bettors accounted for $67,498 of the amount bet on the track's races each day.
Mystery Giver first raced on the Fair Grounds turf course on Dec. 22, 2001, five years ago. And five years is a long time in the career of a Thoroughbred racehorse. In those five years, Mystery Giver became one of the dominant Fair Grounds turf horses, winning three straight editions of the Fair Grounds Breeders' Cup - including the 2002 race in his second-ever Fair Grounds grass start - and capturing the track's most important turf race, the $500,000 Mervin Muniz Handicap in March 2004.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - Come Friday night, trainer Dean Pederson will know a lot more than he did Friday morning.
He has runners entered in both of the day's features at Bay Meadows, a pair of first-level allowance races.
Wavy Lass has four rivals in a one-mile race for 2-year-old fillies. Osiris Lunus is one of 10 entered in a 1 1/16-mile race scheduled for turf, but is one of two entrants listed for the main track only.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Total daily average handle on live racing for the 162-day Woodbine meeting that ended Sunday was $2,058,577, compared with $2,222,174 for last year's 164-day meeting, a decline of 7.3 percent.
Total all-sources handle for the meet was $333,489,534, a decline of 8.57 percent from last year. The per-race handle for 1,494 races this year was $223,219.
A total of $81.4 million in purses was paid out, down slightly from $82.7 million last year.
Track management announced that the Dec. 31 Arizona Juvenile has been renamed the $50,000 Lost in the Fog Juvenile, honoring the late champion sprinter of 2005 who holds the course record here for 6 1/2 furlongs. Lost in the Fog sizzled the distance in 1:13.55 to win the 2004 Arizona Juvenile by slightly more than 14 lengths, just .35 of a second off the world record. Owned by Harry Aleo and trained by Greg Gilchrist, Lost in the Fog was euthanized in September after suffering from cancer.
Delta Downs has been a hot spot for some big names. Just two weeks after hosting a number of high-profile names, such as owner Toby Keith, trainer Bob Baffert, and jockey Garrett Gomez, on Delta Jackpot Night, the track will welcome retired Hall of Fame rider Pat Day on Saturday night.
Jockey Ted Gondron has been noticeably absent this meet at Sam Houston Race Park. The track's all-time winningest rider, he is healing from leg and back injuries sustained in a spill in October. Gondron plans to resume riding this meet at Sam Houston, and said Wednesday he hopes to be back getting on horses in January.
CHICAGO - Hawthorne will cut purses by 7 percent when its final condition book begins Dec. 17, Hawthorne general manager Jim Miller said Wednesday. The purse cut comes in the face of handle figures that are struggling to keep pace with last season's numbers, and an ongoing problem with an overpaid purse account.