HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - A pair of Grade 3 winners, Ecclesiastic and Woodlander, will try to assert their class edge over seven rivals in Friday's $37,000 feature at Gulfstream Park. The third-level allowance race on the turf highlights a 10-race card that also includes an attractive entry-level allowance sprint for 3-year-old fillies.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Well Said is an improving colt who will get his first significant class test Saturday when he makes his stakes debut in the Grade 3, $300,000 Rebel Stakes at Oaklawn Park. He is expected to face a large field in the 1 1/16-mile race, including graded-stakes winners Lawyer Ron and Private Vow.
Well Said has won his maiden and an allowance in his last two starts. He drove to a 1 3/4-length win in the one-mile allowance on Feb. 16, and earned a career-best Beyer Speed Figure of 86.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Flying Glitter has turned in some strong works at Oaklawn Park, and on Friday the multiple Grade 3 winner will make her first start of the year in the featured ninth race. The six-furlong optional claimer for fillies and mares drew five others, and all are stakes performers: Caviar Emptor, True Kiss, Singit, Miss Elsie, and D Fine Okie.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - A year ago, Nick Zito was like the 1991-92 Michigan men's basketball team when he brought the Fab Five to the Kentucky Derby. This year, Zito is more like Syracuse, perched on the bubble and needing a mini-miracle to make the Big Dance.
"I got to get a Gerry McNamara shot and I'm back in the game,'' said Zito, referring to the Syracuse guard who virtually single-handedly shot Syracuse from the NCAA Tournament bubble to the Big East Tournament championship and a No. 5 seed in the Atlanta region.
STICKNEY, Ill. - Not wanting to butt heads again with Lawyer Ron and Steppenwolfer - to say nothing of highly ranked Kentucky Derby hopeful Private Vow - the connections of the 3-year-old Celluloid Hero have abandoned Oaklawn Park in favor of Hawthorne Race Course. They also, for the time being at least, have decided to return Celluloid Hero to sprint racing after a failed effort in the $250,000 Southwest Stakes last month.
ALBANY, Calif. - Trainer Greg Gilchrist has the only two runners in Friday's Eire Go Brach Stakes at Golden Gate Fields who are not stakes winners.
He also has the two 3-year-old fillies to beat in the $40,000-added stakes at six furlongs.
"To be running for $40,000 is kinda ridiculous," Gilchrist said. "I've had easier spots in $100,000 races."
Rapid Proof is back. The winner of last year's $200,000 Connally Breeders' Cup Turf will make his first start in six months Friday night in the featured eighth race at Sam Houston Race Park.
A 1 1/16-mile allowance on turf, the race will serve as his springboard to this year's Connally, said his trainer, Hal Wiggins. The 1 1/8-mile Connally will be held on April 8, for the first time as a Grade 3.
Jockey Mario Pino, acting upon the advice of his doctor, has reluctantly given up his mount on promising 3-year-old Sweetnorthernsaint.
Pino, 44, will miss four to six weeks after undergoing surgery to repair a hernia on Wednesday. As a result, Pino, who had been the regular rider of Sweetnorthernsaint, will be replaced by Kent Desormeaux for Saturday's Grade 3 Gotham Stakes at Aqueduct.
Fairmount Park opened its 90-day meet Tuesday afternoon under conditions far better than on opening day last year. Fairmount began its 2005 meet on a chilly, wet Friday evening, and, given that the opener was moved up 11 days this year, things could have been much worse weatherwise. Fans in attendance Tuesday, however, enjoyed the races under clear skies with the temperature well into the 40's.
