ARCADIA, Calif. - Unusual Suspect and Warning Zone have waited two months for the $60,000 Pinjara Stakes on Thursday at Santa Anita's Oak Tree meet.
Southern California 2-year-old racing is heavy with sprints, a dynamic that does not shift until autumn. After maiden turf route wins in summer at Del Mar, Unusual Suspect and Warning Zone could only kill time before another opportunity to run long on grass.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Todd Pletcher could set yet another notable record Saturday when he runs A.P. Arrow as the likely favorite in the closing-day feature at the Keeneland fall meet, the $150,000 Fayette Stakes.
Pletcher, who already has set single-season records this year for total stakes wins and earnings, is only one graded stakes victory away from tying the single-year record of 53, set in 1987 by his former boss, D. Wayne Lukas. Pletcher could tie Lukas's milestone on Wednesday in Aqueduct's Grade 3 Discovery Handicap, and then make the record his own on Saturday.
Jet West is out of the California Cup Sprint after undergoing an emergency procedure Monday for colic. Winner of the Cal Cup Sprint last year, Jet West went into distress after a routine gallop Monday at Santa Anita. Trained by Ted H. West and his father Ted West, the 5-year-old Jet West was transported Monday to Chino Valley Equine Hospital where he underwent surgery to untwist an intestine.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - The Kentucky homecoming of native son Rusty Arnold has gone largely unnoticed as the Keeneland fall meet has unfolded, but no worries. The irascible Arnold isn't much for the fanfare that follows some of his fellow trainers, but as long as his horses are doing well, he will be just fine, too.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Thursday marks the 10th anniversary of Woodbine playing host to the 1996 Breeders' Cup, one of the highlights during the storied 50-year history of the track.
There have been many significant changes here since then, including slots-fueled purses, which are among the highest in North America, and the introduction of the synthetic racing surface, Polytrack, on Aug. 30.
CHICAGO - There probably are no plans for Royal Leah to migrate from an allowance race Thursday at Hawthorne to a stakes race in Kentucky - not that such a scenario is implausible. A filly named Bottiglia did just that last weekend, parlaying a fourth-place finish in a Hawthorne second-level allowance grass race into a tough-luck half-length second-place finish at 79-1 Sunday in the $150,000 Dowager Stakes at Keeneland.
ELMONT, N.Y. Trainer Todd Pletcher said Monday that he pre-entered 18 horses for the Breeders Cup World Thoroughbred Championships, to be held Nov. 4 at Churchill Downs. He said he pre-entered three horses in five of the eight races and the only race in which he will not have a starter is the $2 million Mile.
Many grass runners have taken an immediate liking to Woodbine's Polytrack. On Wednesday, turf expert Archer's Dreamer will make her first start on it in the day's headliner, a $66,800 second-level allowance that will be run at six furlongs. The race has a seven-horse field and an optional claiming price of $62,500.
Archer's Dreamer, trained by Roger Attfield for Harlequin Ranches, finished third, beaten 8 1/2 lengths, in last year's restricted Passing Mood Stakes. She capped her 2005 campaign with a victory over Ontario-sired opponents in a seven-furlong allowance Oct. 14.
They finished in a dead heat in the spring, and as the Keeneland fall meet winds to a conclusion, Julien Leparoux and Rafael Bejarano once again are in a pitched battle for leading-rider honors.
As the final four-day stretch of the meet commences Wednesday with a nine-race card, Leparoux and Bejarano both have 23 wins. They are hoping to secure as many mounts as possible through Saturday, the end of the 17-day meet, but whatever the final result, both are wishing each other well and are saying they thrive on the spirited rivalry that has unfolded.
You could call Shaggy Mane's rise from claimer to stakes winner a Cinderella story.
Since being claimed for $12,500 at Santa Rosa on Aug. 3, she won two straight allowance races, then knocked off northern California sprint queen Vaca City Flyer in the William P. Kyne Breeders' Cup Express at Bay Meadows on Saturday.
Trainer Lloyd Mason said Shaggy Mane was reputedly something of a head case before he claimed her, when she was racing in Southern California. She was sent north and won a bottom-level maiden claimer for $8,000 on July 4 at Pleasanton.