LEXINGTON, Ky. - They didn't do anything to anybody. All they wanted to do was run in a nice, little, one-turn, graded race with a $250,000 pot. And what did the owners and trainers with fillies in the Stonerside Beaumont Stakes get?
A date with a monster.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - After weeks of trying to decide which race would serve as the final Kentucky Derby prep for The Cliff's Edge, trainer Nick Zito announced Tuesday that the colt will join stablemate Birdstone in the lineup for the $750,000 Toyota Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland on Saturday.
LEXINGTON, Ky. - Californians, here they come. The history of the Blue Grass Stakes is dotted with the occasional California horse making Keeneland his last stop before the Kentucky Derby, but the Blue Grass that will be run Saturday sports an unusually strong California slant.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - When his Georgica Stable won Grade 1 races on consecutive days last September, owner Peter Minikes called it the best weekend of his life.
There's a chance this week could top that.
Monday, Minikes welcomed his first child into the world when his wife, Jeni, gave birth to a baby girl named Jessie. Saturday, Minikes will find out if he has his first Kentucky Derby horse when Master David runs in the Grade 1, $750,000 Wood Memorial at Aqueduct.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Owner Michael Gill and trainer Nick Canani have nine starters on Thursday's eight-race program at Santa Anita, but they wanted more.
"We entered 14 horses," Canani said.
But not all of the races in which Gill and Canani submitted entries are going on Thursday, leaving them with two-horse entries in the second, fifth, sixth, and seventh races, and one runner in the third race.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Kent Desormeaux has accumulated nearly every milestone available to an American jockey since his career began in 1986.
He has won two Kentucky Derbies, three Eclipse Awards, and led the nation's riders in wins for three consecutive years, from 1987-89. His 598 victories in 1989 remain a single-season mark.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - A pair of strong allowance races for 3-year-olds highlights Thursday's card at Bay Meadows.
Eight runners, including the 3-0 Wine Spoken Here, meet in a six-furlong race, while Lava Man tops an interesting field of five in a 1 1/16-mile turf contest.
The sprint is a speed-laden event in which several of the performers will run for the first time at a track other than Golden Gate Fields.
Trainer Bob Hess saddles Fierce Knight, who will be making his Bay Meadows debut but who has run at three different tracks in his six-race career.
Delta Downs in Vinton, La., reported a 32 percent increase in handle during its Thoroughbred meet that closed on March 27, according to figures the track released on Tuesday.
Delta handled more than $1.2 million a night on its races offtrack, for a total of $105 million. Ontrack, handle on live and simulcast races averaged more than $116,000 a night, for a total of $10 million. Delta raced 86 nights but was forced to cancel one of those programs after two races because of inclement weather.
Turfway Park reported that it handled more than $138.3 million from all wagering sources on its live racing, an increase of nearly 20 percent over last year, at the winter-spring meet that ended last Thursday at the Florence, Ky., track.
The daily average all-sources handle on Turfway races was more than $2.5 million, an increase of more than 9 percent from 2003. Of that, $136,000 was bet ontrack daily. The total gross ontrack handle on Turfway races was slightly more than $7.5 million, an increase of nearly 4 percent.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Shake You Down and Beau's Town will meet for the first time Thursday in the Grade 3, $150,000 Count Fleet Sprint Handicap at Oaklawn, but the circumstances are not ideal. Shake You Down is coming off a rare defeat while Beau's Town has not raced since October.
"You want to see them both at their peak, but you never know, they may fool us," said Dave Hulkewicz, who owns Beau's Town. "If Shake You Down and Beau's Town run their best, you've got a hell of a horse race."