JAMAICA, N.Y. - It appeared to be a good plan at the time. After being forced to miss most of her 3-year-old season because of injury, Raging Fever would get her winter campaign started in Saturday's $75,000 Garland of Roses, an ungraded sprint for fillies and mares that typically comes up light.
Except for this year.
Raging Fever, away from the races since April, will have to make her return against Xtra Heat, the top sprinting filly in the country in Saturday's Garland of Roses at Aqueduct.
NEW ORLEANS - Louisiana Champions Day is here again Saturday, which means Doris Hebert, tucked away at his Evangeline Downs training base in Lafayette, La., is preparing some unusually fast 2-year-old colt for the $100,000 Juvenile, which Hebert has won three times in its 10-year history.
MIAMI - Any notion the winter racing season in south Florida does not begin until Gulfstream Park opens on Jan. 3 was put to rest Wednesday when entries were drawn for Saturday's Grand Slam I program. Four stakes worth $100,000 apiece will be run, including the Grade 3 Tropical Park Turf and My Charmer Handicaps.
Jockey Sidney LeJeune Jr., who was aboard Balkan in the Groovy, is making an impression in his first season at Sam Houston. The rider has won with 29 percent of his mounts this meet to top the standings with 16 wins, two more than second-leading rider Roman Chapa.
LeJeune came to Sam Houston to ride primarily for Asmussen, who leads the trainer standings. LeJeune said he learned of the opportunity to ride for Asmussen through his wife's uncle, jockeys' agent Shawn Bergquist.
HOUSTON - Jeremiah Jack, five-length winner of last Saturday night's $150,000 Texan Juvenile at Sam Houston Race Park, is headed for the $100,000 Lecomte Stakes at Fair Grounds in New Orleans on Jan. 26, said his trainer, Tom Amoss.
Amoss won the Lecomte in 1999 with Some Actor, who finished fifth in the 1998 running of the Texan Juvenile.
The last time Shane Laviolette was in serious contention for a riding title, he incurred one of the most wicked beats possible.
Laviolette led Mike Morgan by five winners atop the Hoosier Park standings going into the final program of the 1999 meet. Then Morgan went out and won six races while Laviolette was blanked.
"That was tough," Laviolette recalled wistfully.
NEW ORLEANS - Running short on grass, Testify is one of the better horses in the Midwest. Yet * is not even the best turf sprinter in his barn. That honor belongs to Morluc, perhaps one of the best turf sprinters in the world, judging from his showing last winter in a top-class race in Hong Kong.
JAMAICA, N.Y. - Winter unofficially began this week with the opening of Aqueduct's inner-dirt track, but Thursday's card is fairly strong by December standards and contains several interesting races.
Foremost among them is the eighth, a second-level allowance at 1 1/16 miles that drew seven fillies and mares, headed by It All Adds Up.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - They had to beg and borrow in the Hollywood Park racing office on Tuesday morning to cobble together enough horses for both Thursday's feature race and the entire eight-race card.
Of the five horses entered in the second race, a starter allowance that carries a purse of $50,000, at least two had to be hustled to make the race go. But it was a struggle all morning. Only 58 horses are in the eight races, an average of 7 1/4 per race.
NEW ORLEANS - Trainer Corale "Bunky" Richards's big day at Louisiana Downs two months ago, when he won three of eight stakes races during a two-day festival of Louisiana-breds, remains fresh in his mind. Richards is in a position to do it again Saturday at Fair Grounds, with five horses to enter on Louisiana Champions Day.
