ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Lorne Richards became the 100th different trainer to win a race at the pandemic-shortened Woodbine meet when he sent out Hell N Wild to win last Sunday’s featured second-level optional claimer.
Richards will have bigger fish to fry Saturday when he sends out the fleet-of-foot British Columbia-bred Infinite Patience in the $500,000 Woodbine Oaks.
Denny Velazquez, a leading rider at Canterbury Park in Minnesota, has been issued a one-year suspension and a $10,000 fine for possessing an electrical device that can be used to shock horses, the maximum penalty that stewards could levy under Minnesota racing rules.
Bodenheimer, an impressive debut winner July 29 at Canterbury Park, will make his next start Sept. 5 in the Iroquois Stakes at Churchill Downs.
Trainer Valorie Lund had either the one-mile Iroquois or the six-furlong Prairie Gold Juvenile at Prairie Meadows in mind for Bodenhemier, and opted this week for the longer, stronger spot.
There were times earlier this year when Larry Rivelli, perennial leading trainer at Arlington, wondered if there would be a 2020 meeting at Arlington. And when it finally became clear, in late June, that the track was on course to run an abbreviated season this summer, Rivelli was more than ready.
Rivelli enters the third week of the Arlington season with a record of 18-9-8 from 47 starters, which would be dominant on the face of things, and is an even stronger mark considering Rivelli usually has multiple entries in a single Arlington race.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Bill Mott is planning to have a runner in Sunday’s $500,000 Saratoga Oaks with recent acquisition Ricetta, a daughter of Camelot owned and bred by Juddmonte Farms. Ricetta won 2 of 3 starts in Europe, where she was trained by trainer John Gosden.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Harvey’s Lil Goil is a stakes winner on turf and dirt. Some speed figures have her faster on turf, others dirt.
Naturally, trainer Bill Mott has two options this weekend in which to run Harvey’s Lil Goil – Saturday’s Grade 1, $500,000 Alabama on dirt, or Sunday’s $500,000 Saratoga Oaks Invitational, an ungraded race, on turf.
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SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Both trainer Todd Pletcher and the betting public were expecting big things from the highly touted 2-year-old prospect Mutasaabeq when he debuted here last Saturday. And in the end neither was disappointed after the promising juvenile drew off to a 4 1/2-length victory as the 4-5 favorite in the 5 1/2-furlong maiden special weight dash.
Mutasaabeq, a son of Into Mischief owned by Shadwell Stable, had posted a pair of bullet gate works in the weeks leading up to his first start.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – The Saratoga meet reaches the halfway point Wednesday, and New York Racing Association officials can only hope business remains as robust during the second half of the summer as it was the first.
All-sources handle through the first 19 days of the 40-day meet was $362,577,261, a 17.3 percent increase over the $309,125,934 handled through the same time period of 2019.
HENDERSON, Ky. – Art Collector emerged from his fourth straight victory in good order as trainer Tommy Drury starts making plans to get the colt ready for the Sept. 5 Kentucky Derby.
Art Collector earned a 100 Beyer Speed Figure as a front-running, 3 1/4-length winner of the $200,000 Runhappy Ellis Park Derby on Sunday. It was the fourth open-lengths triumph in as many starts this year for the son of Bernardini, as well as his third straight triple-digit Beyer.
“Everything seems fine this morning,” Drury said early Monday.
Green Gratto, the 10-year-old Grade 1 winner who finished last Sunday in his return to the races off a two-year-layoff at Monmouth Park in New Jersey, will be retired and sent to his owners’ farm in Florida, his trainer said Monday.
Kathleen O’Connell, Green Gratto’s trainer, said that the horse banged his right foreleg at the start of the race, and she provided a picture showing a superficial wound at the bottom of his right fetlock. He finished last of seven in the optional-claiming race and was jogged to the finish line.
