DEL MAR, Calif. - Horse Greeley capped an ideal summer at Del Mar for jockey Victor Espinoza by racing to victory in the Grade 2, $250,000 on Wednesday's closing-day card.
Horse Greeley ($8.40) outfinished favored Great Hunter by 1 3/4 lengths, with Stormello another 1 1/4 lengths back in third. Prime Ruler, the second choice, finished last in the field of seven in a dull try. His rider, Jon Court, lost his left iron at the start, but got it back in the stirrup within 100 yards.
ELMONT, N.Y. - It may lack the pomp and circumstance of Saratoga, but Belmont Park's 33-day fall meet that begins on Friday will surely not lack for drama and intrigue.
Of the 36 stakes races scheduled here over the next 6 1/2 weeks, 12 of them will be Grade 1 events that will help determine the top East Coast contenders for the 23rd Breeders' Cup World Thoroughbred Championships to be held Nov. 4 at Churchill Downs.
ELMONT, N.Y. - The last time Bushfire raced at Belmont Park, her trainer, Eddie Kenneally, expressed concern about running her back too quickly following a hard-fought victory in a Grade 1 race.
That certainly won't be an issue for Kenneally when he brings Bushfire back from a 10-week layoff in the $250,000 Gazelle Stakes, one of three Grade 1 races scheduled for Saturday at Belmont Park.
POMONA, Calif. - Mel Stute has been training winners at the Los Angeles County Fair since practically the beginning of time.
Back to when Fairplex Park was called simply "Pomona" and nobody really cared what happened there. "It used to be more fun than serious," Stute said.
Horseplayers and horsemen still have fun at the Fair, but the game has changed since the first pari-mutuel meet there in 1933. And while Stute, 79, has racked up 183 wins at Fairplex, the all-time leading trainer has noticed a shift.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Point Ashley, who cruised to a 2 1/2-length win in Monday's Del Mar Debutante, came out of the race in good condition and will have one more start before heading to Churchill Downs for the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies on Nov. 4, according to her trainer, Bob Baffert.
"That was awesome," Baffert said of her performance. "What I loved about it is she broke on top, then Victor got her back, got her outside, and got her to be patient. She's a really good filly. She's always shown so much quality.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Breeders' Stakes winner Royal Challenger switches from turf to Woodbine's Polytrack in Friday's headliner, an allowance prep for the Oct. 1 Ontario Derby.
Royal Challenger has come a long way since he got drilled in an $80,000 maiden claimer at Gulfstream in February. Following a three-month absence, he graduated with little fanfare here in a minor seven-furlong maiden race.
AUBURN, Wash. - Idabetabuck has the right style to prevail in Friday's Emerald Downs feature, a six-furlong race for $20,000 claimers that has lured a field of six older sprinters.
Idabetabuck, a 4-year-old son of Individual Style from the barn of trainer Frank Lucarelli, is coming off a sharp score over $15,000 claimers in which he came from just off the pace to score by 4 1/4 lengths in 1:09.40. That stalking style should serve Idabetabuck well on Friday, as he will be meeting a great deal of speed.
Tartan Star, beaten a neck by Langara Lass in the 1 1/16-mile Sonoma here Aug. 12, shortens up to a mile and faces just four rivals in the fourth running of the Filly Sales Stakes on Friday evening. Each of the 3-year-old fillies in the $50,000 stakes will carry 119 pounds, and Tartan Star stands out as the class of the field.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - Steve Flint was not the only person to watch with interest the Spinaway Stakes on Monday at Saratoga, a 2 year-old filly race with major implications for the fall. And Flint was familiar with the 5 1/4-length winner of the Grade 1 Spinaway, Appealing Zophie, since a month earlier a filly Flint trains, Change Up, had beaten Appealing Zophie by more than four lengths.
The Illinois Thoroughbred Horse-men's Association denied Television Games Network the right to broadcast the Arlington Park signal on Wednesday, though the horsemen's issue with TVG concerns Hawthorne Race Course and not Arlington, according to Justin Cassity, executive director of the horsemen's group.
