EAST BOSTON, Mass. - Saturday will have an opening-day feel at Suffolk Downs following a dark week to install a new dirt surface.
The weather might not cooperate with the other major opening of the weekend, however, as the Thomas F. Moran Stakes on Saturday is the first race of the year scheduled for the turf course. There are 11 Massachusetts-breds entered in the 1 1/16-mile race, but expected rain could force the Moran to the dirt and delay the opening of the grass course for a few days.
Jeremy Rose has decided to expand his horizons.
Rose, who won a meet-leading 150 races at Delaware Park in 2001 en route to earning an Eclipse Award as the nation's leading apprentice, announced this week that he intends to ride at Monmouth Park and in Maryland in addition to Delaware.
Rose, 24, said his decision to stop riding mostly at Delaware is partly because he and trainer Tim Ritchey parted ways in February. Rose formerly rode first-call for Ritchey and got many live mounts.
FORT ERIE, Ontario - Jockey Jake Barton, who won six stakes races at Woodbine last year, has now become a member of the Fort Erie rider colony.
Barton bought a house here last summer and had been commuting to Woodbine.
Barton said he had been riding only one or two a day at Woodbine. "It's a long way to drive for just that," he said. "I'm staying here to get more business. But I'll still go up to Toronto to ride some horses."
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Trainer Malcolm Pierce took a swing at the 2001 Connaught Cup with Silver Axe, who finished third in the race's first division.
Saturday, Pierce will be hoping to wield a sharper weapon in Silver Spear, who will be making his 2003 debut in the 1 1/16-mile feature, the first turf stakes of the Woodbine meeting.
"I wasn't planning on this being his first start of the year," said Pierce. "But we're going to go in and take a look. I think my horse is fit enough."
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Red Sea, victorious in a division of the 2001 Connaught Cup Stakes, should be a major force in this year's running of the Grade 3 turf race Saturday at Woodbine.
Red Sea has had his share of ups and downs since his Connaught Cup win, according to trainer Roger Attfield. Attfield purchased the 7-year-old late in 2001 from the estate of Prince Fahd Salman, and then laid him up until last September.
"He was pretty worn out when I bought him," Attfield said, "but he's rebounded well."
WINNIPEG, Manitoba - Kalfaari, last year's champion older horse at Assiniboia, is expected to pick up where he left off when seven of the best older horses on the grounds meet at 5 1/2 furlongs in the $16,000 allowance feature here Saturday.
Owned and trained by Clint Willson, Kalfaari was 4 for 4 here last year, with victories in the G. Sydney Halter, Free Press, and Wheat City before being sidelined by an injury in mid-August.
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas - Bluesthestandard, a former $10,000 claimer, will shoot for his sixth straight win Monday in the $300,000 Lone Star Park Handicap. He has come a long way, but just how far can he go?
It's a question that pertains not only to distance, but also the class ladder.
"He's surprising us in both categories," said Ted H. West, who trains Bluesthestandard for Jeffrey Sengara. "When we claimed him, we didn't even think about two turns, and we definitely didn't think he was going to be a stakes horse."
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas - Little Treasure, whose biggest career win was at one mile last year in the Grade 2 San Clemente Handicap at Del Mar, could be coming into a peak race Monday for the Grade 3, $200,000 WinStar Distaff at Lone Star Park.
The one-mile turf race for fillies and mares, which is one of seven stakes races on the card, will be her third start following a five-month layoff.
"I think it's a good spot for her," said Laura de Seroux, who trains Little Treasure. "The mile is her best distance, and I think the turf course will suit her. She likes a firm turf."
ELMONT, N.Y. - With a gaggle of media dogging his every move Wednesday at Belmont Park, Funny Cide returned to the track for the first time since winning last Saturday's Preakness.
With Robin Smullen aboard, Funny Cide went to the main track at 9:15 a.m. on a drizzly and overcast day. He alternated between a jog and a canter while traveling the wrong way once around Belmont's 1 1/2-mile oval.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Before the stakes-packed holiday weekend gets underway, an ordinary racing card, likely to be run under soggy conditions, awaits fans at Belmont Park on Friday.
The feature of the twilight racing card is a second-level allowance race for fillies and mares. The one-mile dirt race drew six runners and has a scheduled post of 6:36 p.m. Eastern.
The horse to beat is the Allen Jerkens-trained Passing Shot, who is owned by Joseph Shields Jr., a New York Racing Association vice chairman. Passing Shot seeks her first win since May 2002 at Aqueduct.
