ALBANY, Calif. - The 2003-04 Golden Gate Fields meeting, which runs from Nov. 5 through April 4, has scheduled four fewer stakes races than last year and pushed back by a week one of the meeting's premier stakes races.
The Grade 3, $200,000 El Camino Real Derby, which has produced a number of Triple Crown and major stakes winners, among them Tabasco Cat, Charismatic, and Ten Most Wanted, has been pushed back from the first weekend in March to March 13.
Attendance and wagering records were set at the 17-day fall meet that ended Saturday at Keeneland Race Course in Lexington, Ky.
Handle from all sources totaled more than $112.7 million, surpassing the $106.3 million from last fall, when just 16 days were run. Per-day handle averaged $6,633,734, not including imported simulcasts or separate-pool handle. Total attendance was 232,382, which narrowly surpassed the previous record for a fall meet, set in 1988. Average attendance was 13,669.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - My Vintage Port will try to nail down the Sovereign Award as this year's champion 2-year-old filly Wednesday at Woodbine, when she seeks her third consecutive stakes score in the $133,125 South Ocean.
Sovereign contenders Blonde Executive and America America both bombed on Sunday, leaving the door wide open for My Vintage Port, who might not even need to win the 1 1/16-mile race in order to garner the award.
ARCADIA, Calif. - A two-day pick-six carryover of $456,253 highlights a moderate program at Santa Anita on Wednesday.
The eight-race program includes only one 10-horse field and is led by a $65,000 allowance race designed as a replacement for the Lure Stakes, which failed to draw sufficient entries on Sunday.
Wednesday's pick six covers the third through eighth races. Three races are on turf, two are for maiden claimers, and one is a maiden special weight over 1 1/16 miles.
CHICAGO - It was cold and getting colder here Monday afternoon. Around the corner is a long, dark winter - King Cielo's time of year.
King Cielo thrived on the hard, frozen tracks at Hawthorne last winter, winning by almost 10 lengths in one December race, and finishing second to the crack sprinter Talknow in another. Claimed for $50,000 in June by Susan and Walter Kotzman, and now trained by Jan Ely, King Cielo has been campaigned judiciously and comes into Wednesday's featured seventh race here after a two-month freshening, ready for another winter.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Please Take Me Out controlled the pace through comfortable fractions and hung on for a narrow win in the $84,400 Miss Grillo, the closing-day stakes of Belmont Park's 38-day fall meet.
Please Take Me Out, with Aaron Gryder aboard, was a head winner over Bobbie Use in the Miss Grillo for 2-year-old fillies. It was another length back to Lucifer's Stone in third in the 1 1/8-mile turf race. The favorite, Saree, finished sixth in the nine-horse field.
Please Take Me Out ($28) covered the distance in 1:50.75 over a firm course.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Omitted from the Breeders' Cup Mile when the race oversubscribed, Pie N Burger won his first stakes in California in the $150,000 Seabiscuit Handicap, after the Breeders' Cup races had been run.
Ridden by Pat Valenzuela, Pie N Burger stalked pacesetter Excess Summer to early stretch, took the lead before the eighth pole, and won by a length over Chinkapin. Redattore finished third in the field of 11. Fleetstreet Dancer, the 5-2 favorite, finished sixth.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - Vallarta ($27.80) caught a paceless field, set easy fractions and scored an easy three-length victory in the $68,200 at Bay Meadows on Sunday.
Vallarta, coming off a victory in a $50,000 optional claiming race, made it 3-for-3 over the Longden Turf Course, beating multiple graded stakes winner Ninebanks by three lengths. The winning time was 1:42.30 for 1 1/16 miles.
Aly Bubba edged Surprise Halo for third, one length behind Ninebanks.