It was a good week for the out-of-towners. Five Penn National shippers, four from Delaware Park, and three from Pimlico were among 18 invaders from eight different tracks that won races at Charles Town.
More than half of the week's 50 races drew full 10-horse fields, though late scratches reduced the number to 23 full fields. As proof of how competitive the racing has been, no trainer won more than two races and 47 trainers saddled at least one winner.
ANDERSON, Ind. - Records are made to . . . have an asterisk put beside them.
Sunday, leading rider Terry Thompson equalled a Hoosier Park record by winning six Thoroughbred races on a card. It was the third time this year he tied the record shared by Jon Court and Mike Morgan. Thompson then won for the seventh time on the 12-race card card in a Quarter Horse allowance.
PORTLAND, Ore. - Trainer Steve Fisher began the Portland Meadows meeting with four solid older stakes runners in his barn.
There was eight-time stakes winner Knight Cover, who was retired in a ceremony here last Saturday. There was Playfair stakes winner Wapato Wind, who was retired after cracking a sesamoid bone in a race on Nov. 11. There was local stakes winner Star Expresso, who is now 9 and recovering from a bout with pneumonia.
Purses at Delta Downs in Vinton, La., are expected to remain at their new, higher level of about $80,000 a day despite the setback the track suffered Tuesday when its gaming license was suspended by a district court in Baton Rouge, La.
Boyd Gaming, which took over ownership of Delta in May, had hoped to open a slots casino at the track by mid-December. The ruling, however, stopped the Louisiana Gaming Control Board from granting the track final approval of its casino layout during a meeting Tuesday.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - For races such as the Falls City Handicap, fans of horse racing are thankful. A blockbuster matching six Grade 1 winners is a rarity indeed, so the fact it will happen at Churchill Downs on Thanksgiving Day seems altogether fitting.
"It is one heck of a race," said D. Wayne Lukas, trainer of topweighted Spain. "You've got three winners of Breeders' Cup races and the Spinster winner. It's one of the best filly-and-mare races all year. I don't think we had one this good all summer long."
JAMAICA, N.Y. - Turkey, football, and 10 races from Aqueduct, including the $100,000-added Fall Highweight Handicap, should sate New York sport fans on Thanksgiving Day.
Thursday's holiday card starts at 11 a.m. and is scheduled to conclude at approximately 3:04 p.m.
NEW ORLEANS - Fair Grounds opens its 2001-2002 meet Thursday with perhaps the best colony of horses to stable here in years. The quality of racing in New Orleans has been ticking upward since purses began rising a decade ago, and with the addition this season of several top stables, racing should peak this winter.
"On paper, at least, it's the best group we've had," said track president Bryan Krantz.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Ceeband threatens to turn the Thanksgiving Day feature at Hollywood Park into a one-horse race.
Seven older horses entered the $100,000 On Trust Handicap for California-breds, including track specialist Grey Memo, but Ceeband's sharp current form and cocky attitude at trainer John Sadler's barn suggests he is a short price worth taking.
"He's unconscious right now, he's in a zone," assistant trainer Larry Benavidez said. "Ever since the start of last month, he's been mentally focused; he's got his game face on."
MIAMI - Cousin Gigi was bred in Kentucky, spent most of this season racing in New Jersey, and Thursday will be favored in Florida to win the $50,000 Georgia Peaches Handicap, a race restricted to the progeny of stallions donated to the Georgia Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders' Annual Stallion Season Auction.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - There will be no more wasted time for the Breeders' Cup Mile winner. After 18 months to heal a tendon injury, followed by a seven-month gap that ended with consecutive wins this fall, Val Royal has dived headlong into an ambitious fall campaign that continues - unexpectedly - Saturday at Hollywood Park.
