Saturday's $50,000 Tejano Run Stakes at Turfway Park in Florence, Ky., appeared contentious on paper, and proved competitive on the track.
Three horses finished nearly together, with Double Affair eking out a head victory over Frazee's Folly and Two Point Two Mill.
Jockey Jeff Johnston squeezed Double Affair through an opening on the rail in the stretch, and he caught pacesetter Frazee's Folly in the final strides.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Ask Me No Secrets was worth waiting for. The filly, who did not make it to the races until late last year because of physical setbacks, rewarded the patience of her owner and breeder, Earl Shultz, by winning the Grade 3, $200,000 Oaklawn Breeders' Cup last Saturday in just her fifth career start.
The victory was her first in a stakes, and her third overall, and it enhanced her already significant residual value as a daughter of Seattle Slew and the Secretariat mare In On the Secret.
JAMAICA, N.Y. - Trainer Patrick Biancone calls Gotham Stakes winner Mayakovsky "a New Yorker living in California." That is about to change. When Biancone ships Mayakovsky back to New York for the Grade 1 Wood Memorial on April 13, both horse and trainer will become New Yorkers. Biancone said Monday that he is moving his California-based stable to New York, where he will have a 10-horse string at Belmont Park.
Equality may be headed for bigger and better things after scoring his first stakes victory in the Grade 3, $200,000 Tampa Bay Derby at Tampa Bay Downs.
Trainer Graham Motion said he will have to think seriously about giving Equality a shot against some of the top 3-year-olds in the country, perhaps in next month's Blue Grass Stakes at Keeneland.
ARCADIA, Calif. - The Bobby Frankel Express stormed into the Kentucky Derby picture and steamrolled Siphonic on Sunday at Santa Anita, when the lightly raced Medaglia d'Oro scored a 2 1/2-length victory in the $250,000 , a race in which the heavily favored Siphonic was a poor third.
JAMAICA, N.Y. - Mayakovsky got his win. Saarland got his race. And the connections of the two principal horses in Sunday's $200,000 Gotham Stakes left chilly Aqueduct Sunday afternoon quite content with their position.
Mayakovsky, away from the races since Sept.1, used his speed and class to record a 3 3/4 length gate-to-wire victory in the Grade 3 Gotham before 6,618 at Aqueduct. Saarland, unraced since winning the Remsen last Nov. 24, finished with interest to be second, 2 1/2 lengths ahead of Parade Music.
NEW ORLEANS - The California-based Explicit has traveled from coast to coast, running in sprint stakes throughout his career. His first trip to New Orleans netted him his first stakes win, when he won the $150,000 Pelleteri Breeders' Cup on Sunday at Fair Grounds.
ALBANY, Calif. - Big Shot ($14.80) held off a determined bid by Anstar down the stretch to win the $55,000-added Silky Sullivan Starter Handicap on Sunday at Golden Gate Fields.
The victory in the 1 1/16-mile race that was switched from turf to dirt was the first for trainer Gary Mandella, who had started only three other horses. The winning time was 1:42.53 as Big Shot won for the first time in 12 starts since Aug. 26, 2000.
ARCADIA, Calif. - Perseverence was rewarded on Saturday at Santa Anita when Continental Red, jockey Pat Valenzuela, and trainer Ian Jory combined to win the Grade 2, $250,000 San Luis Rey Stakes in a thrilling, four-horse photo.
Continental Red had been narrowly defeated in two other Grade 2 stakes earlier this meet when he was caught late, but this time he ran down the leader to prevail by a nose over the mare Keemoon.
"He's super tough, super game, and super sound," Jory said. "If ever a horse deserved to win, it's this guy."
