NEW ORLEANS - South Florida-based trainer Todd Pletcher plans to invade Fair Grounds stakes races the next two weekends, first with Balto Star, then with the 3-year-old Indy Dancer.
Balto Star, en route by plane to New Orleans on Wednesday, will start Sunday in the $125,000 Whirlaway. Indy Dancer will run a week later in the Risen Star Stakes.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Perfect Story earned herself a likely starting berth in the Grade 2 Bonnie Miss Stakes on March 14 with a very professional two-length victory over a game but overmatched Final Round in Wednesday's co-featured eighth race at Gulfstream Park.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Javier Castellano, the leading rider at Aqueduct's winter meet, was taken to North Shore University Hospital for precautionary X-rays on his shoulder and neck following a nasty spill in Wednesday's eighth race.
Castellano was aboard River Salt when that 5-year-old mare broke down less than a quarter of a mile into the race. Castellano was unseated and hit the track hard. Though River Salt was part of the early pace, Castellano was fortunate not to be stepped on by a trailing horse.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Azeri may make her 2003 debut in the $500,000 Apple Blossom Handicap at Oaklawn Park on April 5, a race she won in 2002 en route to being named Horse of the Year, trainer Laura de Seroux said on Wednesday.
On Monday, the 5-year-old Azeri was withdrawn from a planned dispersal of the racehorses owned by Allen Paulson Living Trust on March 4 after the beneficiaries of the Trust reached a settlement regarding the future of Azeri and 19 other horses.
The top stakes horses in the Paul Jones stable, including 2002 co-world champion Whosleavingwho, are ready for the Grade 1 Los Alamitos Winter Championship and the Grade 1 Los Alamitos Winter Derby.
Whosleavingwho is one of four horses Jones is pointing to the Winter Championship. Trials are scheduled for Friday night at Los Alamitos. The $150,000 Winter Championship at 400 yards will be held March 1.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - The featured ninth race at Oaklawn Park on Friday will test the conditioning of its eight entrants. All of the horses in the entry-level allowance are returning from layoffs, ranging from six weeks to 10 months. The race will be run over six furlongs for a purse of $31,000.
Scrum has the speed to control the pace, but he has not raced since Aug. 4, when he finished third in an entry-level allowance at Ellis Park. He shows three five-furlong works in preparation for his comeback, and on Friday will be making his first start for trainer Bob Holthus.
NEW ORLEANS - Bill Badgett's barn got hot during the last month at Fair Grounds and has jumped into a tie for fourth place in the standings. And, with four wins in 23 starts at Fair Grounds, Becky Maker has been hot enough to jump-start her nascent training career.
Badgett has a live horse, Run to Victory, in Friday's featured ninth race, while Maker saddles Biorhythm, one of her treasured winners this meet, in the eighth. After Badgett and Maker are done, the day winds up with a wave of maiden 3-year-old sprinters in the 10th race.
ALBANY, Calif. - A pair of Grade 1-winning comebackers, Sligo Bay and Redattore, seem likely to head Saturday's $100,000 Tanforan Handicap at Golden Gate Fields.
Sligo Bay, the 121-pound highweight, is a definite for the race. Redattore, who gets in at 120, will run if an allowance race scheduled for Saturday at Santa Anita doesn't fill. The race did not fill for Friday.
PORTLAND, Ore. - Seven older maiden fillies and mares meet in the Friday night feature at Portland Meadows.
The $8,000 claimer at 5 1/2 furlongs appears to be a virtual match race on paper between the speedy Black Barry Velvet, drawn in the outside post 7, and Bubblegum Red, who breaks from the rail.
Both come off runner-up finishes at this level.
Black Barry Velvet, a 4-year-old, figures to be in front early. She is the only member of the field who has ever had the lead in a sprint.