Blue Ribbon Downs in Sallisaw, Okla., was once at odds with the Choctaw tribe of Oklahoma, but now they are on the same team. The Choctaws purchased Blue Ribbon in November, and on Saturday will open the track for the first of two mixed meets this year. The spring season will run through May 1, while the fall session will extend from Aug. 6 to Oct. 30.
"This year will be the first year the track has offered a split meet," said Robin Akers, a spokesperson for Blue Ribbon.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Sir Oscar won all six of his starts as a 2-year-old, swept the open division of the Florida Stallion Stakes and, along with Second of June and Silver Wagon, was among the leaders of one of the strongest juvenile classes ever stabled at Calder Race Course.
But after finishing fifth in Saturday's Grade 2 Fountain of Youth, Sir Oscar has been taken away from trainer Manny Azpurua by owner-breeder Oscar Novo and placed under the direction of Marty Wolfson.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - As has been the case for most of the this meet, trainer Todd Pletcher will have the horse to beat in Friday's feature, when Willard Straight makes his 4-year-old debut in a fourth-level allowance/optional claiming race over Gulfstream Park's turf course.
has not raced since finishing 11th, beaten only 2 1/2 lengths, in last November's Grade 1 Hollywood Derby. Pletcher believes the pedestrian pace and the lights at Hollywood Park hampered his horse that night.
ARCADIA, Calif. - The Grade 1 Las Virgenes Stakes last Sunday was not kind to sixth- and seventh-place finishers Rahy Dolly and Class Above. Trainer Rafael Becerra said Rahy Dolly has "a problem with her breathing." According to Becerra, Rahy Dolly was making a lot of noise, and may require throat surgery. "If it's something we can fix, we'll do it. If it's something we can't fix, we'll just sprint her."
Rahy Dolly finished second in the Grade 1 Hollywood Starlet in her second start, but is unplaced in two subsequent starts.
ARCADIA, Calif. - The middle of February would be a good time, trainer Bob Baffert said, for "these horses to start doing something." That is, if it is not already too late.
Baffert trains two of the seven colts and geldings in Friday's sixth race at Santa Anita, a first-condition allowance for 3-year-olds. The 1 1/16-mile race could be a prep for a bigger prep. It is Derby season, after all, and Rafael Becerra expressed the sentiments of many with a promising 3-year-old. The trainer of Dream Place, he said, "If he wins this one, the next race will be a jump up."
NEW ORLEANS - In his first two starts Cloud Walker outran the opposition from start to finish. He won his career debut by seven lengths and came back a month later to beat entry-level allowance horses by seven, running a faster six-furlong time than stakes horses did a race later. Cloud Walker's brilliance was obvious, and when he started again 20 days later, the general sense was that this horse could not lose.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Trainer Bernie Flint won the $50,000 Pippin Stakes last weekend at Oaklawn with Drexel Monorail and may run recent stakes winner Ask the Lord in the track's Grade 3, $100,000 Essex Handicap on Saturday. The horses are typical of the quality of the 15 head he has brought to Oaklawn.
PORTLAND, Ore. - Six 3-year-old fillies, five of whom will be attempting a mile for the first time, meet in Friday's Portland Meadows allowance feature.
Under Desert Skies is the lone member of the field to have tried a mile, winning an $8,000 maiden claimer at the distance in her last start. She went wire-to-wire, hanging on determinedly to win by a head, but she will have to come from off the pace to win this race.
NEW ORLEANS - Badge of Silver has developed a strong following at Fair Grounds, and when he finished fifth as the favorite in the General George Handicap on Monday at Laurel Park, the air went out of many of his local fans.
But could anyone have been more acutely disappointed than Badge of Silver's trainer, Ronny Werner? Werner has been around this colt since he was an early-season 2-year-old, and he believed Badge of Silver had been training very well at Fair Grounds leading up to the General George.
For the first time in more than 20 years, the Delaware Oaks has regained its status as a Grade 2 race.
The $500,000 Oaks, scheduled for July 17, was reintroduced to Delaware Park's stakes schedule in 1996 after being discontinued in 1983. The 1 1/16-mile Oaks was last run as a Grade 2 race in 1982. Island Fashion, who won last year's Oaks as a Grade 3, went on to win the Alabama at Saratoga and the La Brea at Santa Anita.