Trainer Cole Norman's trip to Santa Anita last Saturday was a nightmare for him, but not for Pie N Burger, one of the best horses in his stable. It took all the strength he had to make it to the paddock to saddle Pie N Burger to win the $150,000 Seabiscuit Handicap.
Stricken by the flu not long after he arrived in California, Norman was bedridden for a couple of days. He missed all of the Breeders' Cup races except for the Classic, which was run two races before the Seabiscuit.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Fircroft, inactive since finishing last of six in the Grade 1 Alabama at Saratoga in August, returns to the races in a $50,000 allowance race Thursday at Aqueduct.
Fircroft, who is owned by G. Watts Humphrey Jr., will be a deserving favorite among five fillies entered in the 1 1/8-mile dirt race for nonwinners-of-two-other-than.
Fircroft's last win came in the off-the-turf Miss Grillo at Aqueduct on Oct. 27, 2002. The ungraded Miss Grillo was run at the same distance as that of Thursday's allowance race.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - The eighth race at Churchill Downs, a $48,800 nonwinners-of-three allowance, is not the richest race on Thursday, nor is it the deepest. It is simply the classiest, featuring a graded-stakes winner and another with exciting potential.
The seven-furlong sprint drew a field of eight, including Crowned Dancer, the 2002 Hollywood Juvenile Championship winner, and Eugene's Third Son, the runner-up in this year's Arkansas Derby and Lane's End Spiral.
ARCADIA, Calif. - The veteran gelding Macward has long been regarded as the ultimate horse-for-course on Santa Anita's downhill turf layout. But the 7-year-old has fallen into a tailspin. After winning 4 of his first 8 starts down the unique course, age has caught up. Macward has lost nine in a row on the hillside.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Wait till next year.
That will have to do as the battle cry for Soaring Free and Perfect Soul, the only Woodbine-based performers in Saturday's Breeders' Cup at Santa Anita.
Soaring Free, owned by Sam-Son Farm and trained by Mark Frostad, and Perfect Soul, owned by Charles Fipke and trained by Roger Attfield, both competed in the Breeders' Cup Mile.
Soaring Free finished fifth, beaten 3 1/4 lengths, with Perfect Soul another 2 3/4 lengths back in ninth.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - The first thing trainer Brian Koriner did after claiming Tonco for $12,500 last April was try him on turf.
The result was a second-place finish in an allowance race that turned into a victory when Prairie Predator was disqualified. In three turf starts since, Tonco has two victories and a second to Pacifica Handicap winner Vallarta in his last start.
Tonco will try to continue his turf success when he meets five rivals in a $50,000 optional claimer at 1 1/8 miles in Thursday's Bay Meadows feature.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Fans will notice some unplanned changes to the track when Aqueduct opens its doors on Wednesday for its 44-day fall meet.
The New York Racing Association during the summer halted construction on a casino for 4,500 video lottery terminals in its grandstand because of a federal investigation of NYRA officials connected to the convictions of 19 mutuel tellers for income tax evasion and money laundering.
NEW YORK - Volponi, winner of the Breeders' Cup Classic in 2002, has been retired from racing and will stand in 2004 at an undisclosed farm in Kentucky, trainer and part-owner P.G. Johnson said on Monday.
Volponi, by Cryptoclearance out of the Sir Harry Lewis mare Prom Knight, retires with a career record of 7 wins in 31 starts and $3.2 million in earnings. His biggest win was the 2002 Classic, in which he scored by a record 6 1/2 lengths at 43.50-1.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - Bay Meadows heads into the final week of its fall season and ends with what could be one of the most interesting races of the meeting.
The Grade 3 Bay Meadows Derby will be run Saturday with eight 3-year-olds considered likely starters, including 119-pound highweight Urban King, winless but stakes-placed in five stakes for trainer Bobby Frankel. Also expected to run are two Neil Drysdale-trained horses, Mediator and Right Proof, both of whom will carry 115 pounds.