OMAHA, Neb. - Summer in the Midwest means county fairs and street festivals, which is exactly the atmosphere Horsemen's Park will provide on Friday night when it begins its annual three-day festival of racing.
"That's the way we've always promoted it, as a fun race meet," said Dick Moore the track's general manager and vice president of racing.
ELMONT, N.Y. - The star-crossed 3-year-old Buddha suffered another setback that will keep him from making the major races at Saratoga this summer including the Grade 1 Travers.
According to trainer James Bond, Buddha tore a muscle high up in his rear end that will preclude Bond from working him for approximately the next three weeks. Without any serious work for that long, Bond said he could not make the Travers on Aug. 24.
ELMONT, N.Y. - The royally bred Double Cat returns to the races Thursday in a third-level allowance race at one mile that highlights Belmont Park's nine-race card.
A daughter of Storm Cat out of the champion mare Hollywood Wildcat, Double Cat has won three of four career starts for owners Irv and Marjorie Cowan and trainer Neil Drysdale. All three of her wins have come on turf after she lost her debut on dirt by one length. Nevertheless, Double Cat's best Beyer Speed Figure (95) was earned in that dirt race.
AUBURN, Wash. - Most every variety of handicapper will find something to like in Thursday's featured seventh race at Emerald Downs, a six-furlong sprint for $12,500 3-year-olds with an intriguing cast of eight.
Handicappers drawn to sharp current form might not go any further than Take My Heart, who will be stepping up after authoritative back-to-back wins over $6,250 and $8,000 company in his first start for trainer Mark Molina, who claimed him out of his last start for owners Jerry Carmody and James Murphy.
EDMONTON, Alberta - The only Thursday card of the meeting is this week, as the Klondike Days festival begins.
But much of the talk at Northlands Park is about Lord Shogun's impressive performance in last Saturday's $40,000 Ky Alta.
Lord Shogun, shipped from Hastings Park in Vancouver along with regular jockey Dave Wilson to win the Ky Alta, a prep for the $150,000 Canadian Derby.
Beau's Town, the Louisiana Downs-based sprinter who has won six of his last seven starts for trainer Cole Norman, was flown out of Bossier City, La., on Tuesday bound for Saratoga Race Course in New York, where he will be trained by Lynn Whiting.
After Saratoga, Beau's Town is to return to Norman, said Dave Hulkewicz, the colt's co-owner who keeps horses with both Norman and Whiting.
CHICAGO - The period that comes just after a jockey loses his apprentice weight allowance is supposed to be difficult, but so far, Elvis Trujillo has navigated it without so much as a scratch.
Yes, Trujillo was shut out Sunday, but that was the exception to his first week as a journeyman. Last Wednesday, his first day riding without the bug, Trujillo won three races, including the first race on the program. He followed that performance with a win each of the next three days - six wins during a week when he was supposed to struggle.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Numerous Times, the 2001 Atto Mile winner, heads a stellar nine-horse field in Thursday's eighth race at Woodbine, a seven-furlong turf allowance for 3-year-olds and up.
The race has also lured 1999 Louisiana Derby winner Kimberlite Pipe.
Numerous Times and Kimberlite Pipe finished fourth and 11th, respectively last time out on June 23 in the Nearctic Handicap, a Grade 2 turf event won by California invader Nuclear Debate.
OCEANPORT, N.J. - Trainer Dennis Manning has a variety of horses in his barn, ranging from 2-year-olds all the way up to the 8-year-old grass stakes winner Key Lory. But it's his arsenal of juveniles that will make the most noise out of the barn in the next month as the Sapling and Sorority Stakes approach.
Stakes horses are arriving at Delaware Park daily in anticipation of the $600,000 Delaware Handicap and the five other stakes to be run this weekend at the Stanton, Del., track.
Starrer, from California, and Pompeii, from Kentucky, are among the recent arrivals for the Delaware Handicap, a Grade 3 race that attracted a field of 10 fillies and mares when entries were taken Tuesday.