FORT ERIE, Ontario - Dressed for Action, idle since winning the $77,000 Adena Springs Matchmaker here June 13, will likely go as the co-favorite with another 4-year-old, Miss Crissy, in Sunday's $125,000 Rainbow Connection for Ontario-sired fillies and mares.
After the $500,000 Prince of Wales and the $250,000 Labatt Bison City, the Rainbow Connection has the third-highest purse of the 24 stakes on Fort Erie's calendar.
WINNIPEG, Manitoba - Nominations have closed for the $100,000 Manitoba Lotteries Derby on Aug. 2, and Shanghied, perfect in three starts here including two stakes, heads the local contingent.
Albarino, owned and bred by Ross McKague of Brandon, Manitoba, is scheduled to arrive by van from Woodbine on Wednesday night. Trained by former Assiniboia Downs trainer Sandy McPherson, Albarino defeated maiden special company at Woodbine in his most recent start, his first trip around two turns.
Other derby nominees of interest include Korbyn Gold and Plum Red.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Since arriving from France last winter, is a nose away from having a perfect record. Three wins in four starts, including a win in the Grade 2 Beverly Hills Handicap at Hollywood Park in late June, have vaulted her into a leading role in California's competitive filly and mare turf division.
Saturday, Light Jig's career trajectory can continue when she starts in the richest race of her career in the $400,000 John Mabee Handicap for fillies and mares at Del Mar.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Disappointed? Sure. Distraught? Hardly.
Those were the sentiments coming from the connections of Ashado after she was upset by Stellar Jayne in last month's Mother Goose Stakes. Saturday, Ashado gets a chance to avenge that loss while re-establishing her standing as the top 3-year-old filly in the country in the Grade 1, $500,000 at Belmont Park.
The Coaching Club has been shortened from 1 1/2 miles - a distance at which it had been run 25 times since 1971 - to 1 1/4 miles, the distance at which it was run from 1990 through 1997.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - From top to bottom, Saturday's Arlington Handicap is a cut above recent editions of the race. Designed as a local prep for the Aug. 14 Arlington Million, it might really serve as one.
But there is one thing missing from Grade 3, $250,000 Handicap, and that is any semblance of pace.
Arlington's European-style turf course should showcase a European-style race: slow fractions, a bunched field, and a mad dash home.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - South Bay Cove will try to rebound from her loss in the My Dear Stakes when she runs in Saturday's $160,350 Shady Well Stakes, a 5 1/2-furlong dash for Canadian-bred 2-year-old fillies.
Trained by Roger Attfield for Windhaven, South Bay Cove earned the highest Beyer Figure by a 2-year-old at Woodbine this year, an 87, when she won her debut in a 4 1/2-furlong maiden special weight race May 22.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - Fifteen minutes after easily won the Arlington Classic here July 3, his trainer, Laura de Seroux, deemed Toasted an unlikely participant in the American Derby. A day later, her opinion seemed even more slanted toward skipping the race and going straight to the Grade 1 Secretariat on Aug. 14.
But when Toasted returned to de Seroux's home base at San Luis Rey Downs in California, he looked nothing like a horse needing six weeks between starts. "He was on his toes," de Seroux said.
ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - Bedanken might have beaten better horses before, but she probably has never won as easily as she did July 5 at Arlington. Running in an overnight turf stakes, Bedanken clung to the rail until she turned for home. She bumped another horse as she made her move, but that did nothing to deter Bedanken, who flew up to the leaders in a matter of strides and went past them while her rider, Don Pettinger, sat still as a stone.
"She had as good an acceleration as you can see," said Pettinger, reached by phone in Oklahoma.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Designed for Luck, a top turf miler in California in the last year, is facing retirement because of a suspensory injury suffered in training earlier this month.
Trainer Vladimir Cerin said Thursday that Designed for Luck, 7, has suffered a "small tear" in the suspensory of his left foreleg. Cerin said the injury will be reassessed this fall before the retirement is finalized.
