FORT ERIE, Ontario - Lenny the Lender, a Fort Erie regular, will be entered in two turf stakes on the holiday weekend at Woodbine, the $125,000 Halton at 1 1/8 miles on Sunday and the Grade 2, $300,000 Niagara at 1 1/2 miles on Monday.
Lenny the Lender, 9, has not won in his last 18 starts. His last score was on Oct. 31, 2002.
He has, however, made good money for his owner-trainer, Dick Jukosky, during that stretch by finishing second in a number of turf stakes.
SASKATOON, Saskatchewan - Excessively Sweet goes in search of her third straight stakes victory to kick off her career in Saturday's $22,500 Prairie Lily Sales Stakes at Marquis Downs. The seven-furlong race is for graduates of the 2004 Prairie Lily yearling sale.
Excessively Sweet, the first runner from the sire You've Got Action's first crop, has never been behind a runner at any call. She faces eight rivals Saturday in the meet's richest race.
WINNIPEG, Manitoba - Trainer Carl Anderson sends out the uncoupled trio of Lord Shogun, Albarino, and Nugrayontheblock against five rivals at Assiniboia Downs in Saturday's $40,000 R.J. Speers for 3-year-olds and upward at 1 1/16 miles.
Lord Shogun has won two of his last three races, including the allowance prep for the R.J. Speers on Aug. 19. A 6-year-old son of Maudlin, Lord Shogun appears to be a horse who needs the lead. The two times this year he didn't make the lead, he finished seventh in the Wheat City Stakes and sixth in the Free Press Stakes.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Pussycat Doll was a top contender for the Grade 1 Las Virgenes Stakes last winter at Santa Anita when trainer Bob Baffert pulled her out of the race because he was concerned over the wet-fast conditions.
He wound up doing more than that in the following days, taking Pussycat Doll out of training entirely.
"She wasn't doing that well, and I turned her out," Baffert said.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Tucked Away, the upset winner of the Grade 2 Clement Hirsch Handicap at Del Mar last month, was seriously injured during a turf workout on Wednesday. Tucked Away suffered cracked sesamoids in her right foreleg, according to trainer Paddy Gallagher.
There is fear that the injury is life-threatening, but Gallagher said every effort was being made to save Tucked Away as a broodmare.
"Both sesamoids are cracked," Gallagher said. "We're getting a couple of vets to see what they think is best."
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Because of a soaked turf course on Wednesday morning, Saratoga officials decided to scratch both steeplechases races on the card - an allowance race and the Grade 1 New York Turf Writers Cup Steeplechase Handicap. The remnants of Hurricane Katrina dumped about 1 1/2 inches of rain on the area overnight.
Zarella Ore, a 26-year-old apprentice jockey severely injured in a paddock mishap at River Downs on Sunday, is recuperating from surgery performed Tuesday at University Hospital in Cincinnati.
Ore had screws inserted in both sides of her hip and in the right side of her pelvis, said her agent, Mitch Reed. Ore also injured parts of her spine, which did not require surgery to repair.
A full recovery is expected, but Ore faces upwards of six to eight months of therapy, Reed said.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Standing in the shed row of his barn Wednesday morning as rain steadily poured, trainer Rusty Arnold said his 2-year-old filly Southern Protocol might be unlucky yet again in finding a race that actually stayed on the turf.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - The week began with the Australian champion Alinghi winning a stakes race in her North American debut. The connections of Keep the Faith hope the success of Australian-bred horses continues through Saturday's Grade 1 Forego Stakes.
Keep the Faith, an Australian-bred son of Sunday Silence, was brilliant in his North American debut, winning a classified allowance race at Belmont Park on July 24. Making his first start in 15 months, Keep the Faith ran six furlongs on turf in 1:06.82, a North American record for the distance.
