ALBANY, Calif. - The millionaire 6-year-old mare Moscow Burning is strictly the one to beat in Saturday's $100,000 Work the Crowd Handicap for California-bred fillies and mares at Golden Gate Fields, spotting six rivals from six to 13 pounds in the 1 1/16-mile turf race.
has won both of her starts this year, the $500,000 Sunshine Millions Filly and Mare Turf and the $108,000 Pro or Con.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Trainer Richard Dutrow nominated three horses to next Saturday's Grade 1, $300,000 Carter Handicap and said Thursday it is possible all three could run. Silver Train, last year's Breeders' Cup Sprint winner, is a definite, while Call the Lord and Kazoo are being seriously considered.
Silver Train finished seventh as the favorite in the Richter Scale Breeders' Cup Handicap on March 4, further validating Dutrow's belief that Silver Train does not like Gulfstream Park. He is now 0 for 3 over that surface.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - There are some well-known names with a bevy of graded stakes wins on their resumes entered in Saturday's $200,000 Excelsior Breeders' Cup Handicap at Aqueduct.
But it may be the horses still seeking their initial graded stakes glory who are the ones to beat in the Grade 3 Excelsior, run at 1 1/8 miles over Aqueduct's main track.
Grade 1 winners may light the marquee, but Colita, Liquor Cabinet, Your Bluffing, and Infinite Glory are most likely to steal the show.
After urging her mounts to come-from-behind neck victories in stakes each of the past two weekends at Laurel Park, what can 18-year-old apprentice Rosie Napravnik do for an encore?
Don't be surprised if she does it again Saturday aboard Sea Pines in the $75,000 Smart Halo Stakes at Laurel.
The 10-race live card also includes the $60,000 Snow Goose, a one-mile stakes for fillies and mares.
Sea Pines, who has been second and third in two previous stakes appearances at longer distances, cuts back to six furlongs, where she is 2 for 3, for the Smart Halo.
The $50,000 Fairway Fun Stakes Saturday at Turfway Park includes five stakes winners - Quite a Ruckus, Wendy's on to Me, Cape Hope, Tappin for Gold, and Ella Belle.
Other notable stakes performers among the 12 fillies and mares in the 1 1/16-mile race include Darling Daughter, third in the Grade 3 Sabin Handicap earlier this year at Gulfstream, and Gallant Secret, who rallied to be third behind Summerly in the Grade 1 Kentucky Oaks in 2005.
OLDSMAR Fla. - Fast Hand, who fell just a half-length short of victory in her turf debut and first start in 1 1/2 years, tops a field of some of the faster female turf sprinters on the Tampa Bay grounds in Saturday's optional claiming feature. The race will be run at five furlongs over the turf course.
A dispute between Hollywood Park management and the Thoroughbred Owners of California over purse levels for overnight races and stakes at the upcoming Hollywood Park meeting has yet to be resolved, and a special meeting of the California Horse Racing Board has been called on April 11 to help solve the issue.
The dispute has prevented the official publication of the track's stakes schedule for the spring-summer meeting, which runs from April 26 to July 16.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Woodbine will be celebrating its 50th anniversary this year by remembering its past. But, at the same time, Woodbine will be taking a bold step into the future with the announcement earlier this week of the addition of Polytrack, a synthetic surface that is deemed to be easier on horses than a conventional dirt track.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Allegiances can be as changing as the weather, and the return of the Thoroughbreds to Woodbine brings many new developments among owners and trainers.
Perhaps no individual here has encountered more recent change than Abraham Katryan, who will no longer be training the Kelynack Racing Stable runners of owner Glenn Harvey.
PORTLAND, Ore. - Four stakes winners will vie for divisional honors in Saturday's $10,000-added Oregon Oaks at Portland Meadows, a 1 1/16-mile test for 3-year-old fillies that has drawn a field of six.
Two of the stakes winners - Mt. St. Helens heroine Lawanda, and Janet Wineberg winner Cascades Express - will race as an entry for owners Allen Floyd and Jonathan Nance. Nance, who also trains the entry, said that his main hope rests with Lawanda.
