ARCADIA, Calif. - Special Rate has had a limited campaign in the last year, but when he does start it is often a performance worth noting.
Last fall, Special Rate won the Bien Bien Stakes at Hollywood Park. In August at Del Mar, he returned from a seven-month layoff to win an optional claimer over a mile on turf.
Friday at Santa Anita, will start as the favorite against a strong field in a $53,000 optional claimer over a mile on turf.
ARCADIA, Calif. - The erratic career of Calkins Road has been on an upswing in recent months, just in time for Saturday's $250,000 California Cup Classic at Santa Anita.
In 2002, Calkins Road pulled a 10-1 upset in the California Cup Classic, the final win of a campaign that included a victory in the $250,000 Snow Chief Stakes for 3-year-old statebreds at Hollywood Park that spring.
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - American Freedom, one of the most honest New Jersey-based turf runners, looks for a breakthrough victory Friday night in the Grade 3, $200,000 Cliff Hanger Handicap at The Meadowlands Racetrack.
A 6-year-old gray gelding, is winless in seven starts at the Big M, where he has 1 second and 3 thirds. Overall, American Freedom has won 9 of 34 starts, including a win in this year's Jersey Breeders' Turf Handicap at Monmouth Park.
The Big M failures are a product of the calendar, according to trainer Jamie Woodington.
EDMONTON, Alberta - A Shaky Start, a multiple stakes winner of more than $300,000, towers over her four opponents in Friday's $50,000 Sales Handicap at Northlands Park.
This will be the first running of the one-mile race for fillies and mares, 4 and up, who went through the ring in a local yearling sale.
Owned by Janet and Gary Kropp and trainer Al Strumecki, A Shaky Start got her name after her mother died just after giving birth.
Jockey Roman Chapa's momentum from Retama Park has carried over to Lone Star Park, where he leads the standings two weeks into the fall Breeders' Cup meet, which runs through Oct. 31.
Chapa won the Retama title by 19 wins over his nearest rival, and during the meet won at least one race a card for the first 21 nights. He has come out just as strongly at Lone Star, where he has won eight races in seven days, including the $100,000 Middleground Breeders' Cup for his longtime patron trainer Danny Pish.
CHICAGO - Silver Bid batted just 2 for 14 in 2003, but this year he has been money in the bank, winning five times in six starts. Silver Bid, the sharpest Illinois-bred sprinter going, runs Friday at Hawthorne, where he will have only four opponents in the featured first race.
The old trainer's axiom has echoed through Silver Bid's season: Keep yourself in the best company and your horse in the worst. Deft management by trainer Joel Berndt and owners Eugene Young and Terry Renfrow has landed Silver Bid in the right spots all year.
Two-time Grade 1 futurity winner Azoom and Grade 1 Rainbow Futurity winner Thewayouwant-metoo drew side-by-side post positions in the 10th of 11 trials to the Grade 1 Texas Classic Futurity on Friday night at Sam Houston Race Park, a race that has an estimated purse of $1 million.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - Variety, that proverbial spice of life, can also liven up a mundane race card.
Racing secretary Greg Brent has done that Friday at Bay Meadows, carding an interesting 1 3/8-mile turf race for the day's feature. The $32,000 claimer drew seven entries.
As long as the race is, one of the runners is shortening up. Horatio comes off an eight-length victory in a two-mile race at Emerald Downs on Sept. 20.
Trainer Roger Engel is having a terrific Remington Park meet and has won about as many races as he has horses in training at the track. His stable of 22 horses has accounted for 21 wins, a total that can grow Friday night when Engel's best-known horse, Medium Rare, starts in the sixth race at Remington.
A seven-furlong optional claimer, the race is restricted to horses bred in Oklahoma.
