With the Belmont Stakes on June 20 an option for his next start, Pneumatic – third most recently in the Matt Winn Stakes – has been nominated to the Triple Crown, trainer Steve Asmussen said.
Pneumatic was not an original nominee to the Triple Crown for $600 back in January because he was not going to be ready for the original dates of the Triple Crown, Asmussen said. But with the postponement of all three races, Pneumatic was made eligible for $3,000 by the second deadline Wednesday.
Leading rider Flavien Prat will ride Speech in Saturday’s Grade 2 Santa Anita Oaks for 3-year-old fillies.
Speech, trained by Michael McCarthy for Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners, was second in her stakes debut in the Grade 3 Santa Ysabel Stakes on March 8 at Santa Anita and was later second by a neck in an allowance race with a $100,000 claiming option on May 2 at Oaklawn Park. Both races were at the 1 1/16-mile distance of the Santa Anita Oaks.
Maximum Security, the champion 3-year-old male of 2019 and winner of the $20 million Saudi Cup in February, worked a half-mile in 49.60 seconds on Monday at Santa Anita, the colt’s first workout since joining trainer Bob Baffert’s stable earlier this spring.
Baffert said he hopes to race Maximum Security this summer.
“We’re getting to know him,” Baffert said. “He’s a classy horse. He worked by himself. I’m getting him used to the way I do things.”
ELMONT, N.Y. – Bob Baffert has shipped in two horses to Belmont Park, including Mother Mother, who was one of 10 fillies and mares entered Sunday for Friday’s $80,000 Harmony Lodge Stakes for fillies and mares at six furlongs. Mother Mother, a daughter of Pioneerof the Nile, is a two-time listed stakes winner including the Kalookan Queen Stakes at Santa Anita in January. On Sunday, Mother Mother worked a half-mile in 48.33 seconds over the main track.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Jockey Luis Saez will miss the first eight days of the condensed 25-day Belmont Park spring/summer meet while he serves out two suspensions from 2019.
Saez will miss Wednesday’s opening-day card as that will be the final day of the 15-day suspension handed him by the Churchill Downs stewards for his ride on Maximum Security in the 2019 Kentucky Derby, in which the horse was disqualified from first and placed 17th for interfering with several runners nearing the top of the stretch.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Code of Honor, who won two Grade 1 stakes last year as a 3-year-old, completed preparations for this seasonal debut in Saturday’s Grade 3, $100,000 Westchester by working a half-mile in 49.09 seconds Monday morning over Belmont Park’s main track. Belmont clockers caught his final quarter in 23.49 and had him galloping out five furlongs in 1:01 and six furlongs in 1:13.40.
“I thought he went as good as I’ve ever seen him go,” trainer Shug McGaughey said. “He handled his leads good, everything was perfect.”
ELMONT, N.Y. – On the day the New York Racing Association returns to action after an 11-week shutdown caused by COVID-19, a 2-year-old colt named Fauci makes his career debut at Belmont Park.
Fauci, of course, is named after Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who for many weeks was a fixture at President Donald Trump’s press briefings related to the coronavirus.
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Tiz the Law departed South Florida for Belmont Park on Monday, one day after turning in the last of a very impressive series of local works prepping for his upcoming start in the Belmont Stakes on June 20. Tiz the Law worked an easy half-mile in 48.20 seconds on Sunday morning at Palm Meadows.
The effects of the coronavirus pandemic on racing schedules around the country have brought some new faces down to South Florida for the summer. The latest is trainer Alfredo Velazquez, who shipped seven horses into Gulfstream Park this past week, including He’s Incredible, one of nine entered in Wednesday’s $47,000 main event, carded under optional-claiming conditions for Florida breds at five furlongs on the turf.
