Jockey Umberto Rispoli’s three-day introduction to Del Mar last weekend included repeated trips to a makeshift winner’s circle, twice after stakes, and the satisfaction of holding an early lead in the jockey standings.
The start of his second week did not begin well.
Wednesday, Rispoli wrote on Twitter that he had tested positive for coronavirus and was asymptomatic.
“I have tested positive for COVID-19,” he said, referring to the coronavirus.
Del Mar had an 18 percent increase in all-sources handle on opening weekend when compared to similar days on the corresponding weekend of the 2019 summer meeting, track president Josh Rubinstein said Tuesday.
“We averaged over $17 million a day,” Rubinstein said. “We were pleased with the results. It was competitive racing.”
Fields averaged 8.17 runners for each of the 30 races over the three days compared to 7.86 runners in 43 races over five days on opening week in 2019.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Seven new names are among the 22 separately listed interests in Pool 6 of the 2020 Kentucky Derby Future Wager, which opens Friday at noon Eastern.
Pool 6 coincides with a second futures pool toward the 2020 Kentucky Oaks, with an Oaks-Derby double future wager also being offered again.
Tiz the Law, winner of the June 20 Belmont Stakes, is listed as the 5-2 morning-line favorite in Pool 6, followed by Art Collector at 9-2 and Honor A. P. at 5-1. Tiz the Law closed as the 2-1 favorite in Pool 5, which ran June 26-28.
WHO’S HOT
There are five newcomers to the Derby Watch top 20, but the most significant move was made by Art Collector, whose Blue Grass victory last Saturday propelled him to the third choice, at 5-1, on the Kentucky Derby line of Marty McGee of Daily Racing Form. Art Collector was 30-1 a week ago. New to the list are Rushie, who is 30-1, and a quartet of 50-1 shots – Dean Martini, Major Fed, Mystic Guide, and Shared Sense – not all of whom are certain to even run in the Derby, raising the possibility that there might not be a full field of 20 this year.
Nearly three weeks after the June 27 Ohio Derby became his first meaningful victory, Dean Martini has cracked both Daily Racing Form’s Derby Watch Top 20 and the Kentucky Derby Future Wager Pool 6 roster of 22 individual betting interests.
Don’t read too deep into that, said trainer Tom Amoss. “He’s going to have to run extremely well in his next race for us to consider moving on to the Derby.”
ELMONT, N.Y. – A horse suffered a fatal breakdown while working Tuesday morning over the Belmont Park training track, the third training-related fatality in three days and ninth over the training track since May 6.
Bourbon High, a 5-year-old New York-bred mare trained by David Adel, was approaching the eighth pole when she suffered an injury to her right front ankle. She had to be euthanized on track.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Who’s the best sprinter at Woodbine? For the first time in four years, one could argue that it’s not perennial champion Pink Lloyd but the turf expert Silent Poet, who is now 2 for 2 at the meet after capturing Saturday’s Grade 2 Connaught Cup.
Mountaineer racetrack in West Virginia has canceled the track’s richest race, the $500,000 West Virginia Derby, citing “the health and welfare of all involved,” according to a letter the general manager sent to staff and the media.
The West Virginia Derby is typically Mountaineer’s most high-profile race, and it was scheduled this year for Aug. 1, along with the West Virginia Governor’s Stakes, a $200,000 race. The letter signed by general manager Jason Pugh stated that the Derby “as well as the entire race card” on Aug. 1 would be canceled.
Ete Indien has suffered “a little setback,” trainer Patrick Biancone informed Tuesday, and thus will not run Saturday in the Haskell Invitational at Monmouth.
Biancone, in a text, did not detail the setback. Biancone said Ete Indien will now train straight into the Kentucky Derby on Sept. 5.
Ete Indien most recently was fourth in an allowance race on June 10 at Gulfstream Park that was won by his stablemate, Sole Volante. Ete Indien has not worked since June 28, when he worked six furlongs on the turf at Palm Meadows. That is his lone work since the June 10 allowance.
Saratoga Race Course will not allow jockeys to ride at the track if the jockey leaves during its upcoming summer meet to ride elsewhere, under a new protocol announced Tuesday in the midst of an unsettling recent spate of positive coronavirus tests in the U.S. riding community.
