LOUISVILLE, Ky. - A mix-up in the identities of two 2-year-old colts from the same stable has led to an investigation, Kentucky chief steward Bernie Hettel announced Friday.
Both colts are owned by Gus Goldsmith and trained by Norman Miracle Jr. One of the colts is by Supremo out of the mare Regal Band, making him a half-brother to 2001 Kentucky Derby winner Monarchos.
STICKNEY, Ill. - Saturday's Sun Beau was the last stakes of Hawthorne's spring meet, and the final six racing days here will feed horseplayers a steady diet of claiming races with the odd allowance or two thrown in. Sunday's card is somewhat atypical, with four of the nine races written under allowance or optional claiming conditions.
OCEANPORT, N.J. - The Todd Pletcher-trained American Century was thought of as a possible Kentucky Derby horse last year at 2, but he showed distance limitations. In Sunday's $50,000 Crank It Up Stakes for 3-year-olds at five furlongs, American Century stays with what he does best - sprinting - and tries turf for the first time.
"He's a nice kind of sprinter," said George Weaver, Pletcher's assistant at Monmouth. "This is a logical race. It's a chance to try him on the turf, and if it's taken off we know he can handle the dirt."
ELMONT, N.Y. - His colleagues have begun calling him Phoenix. Because it appears that trainer John Parisella has risen from the ashes yet again.
Parisella, who was the leading percentage trainer in New York in 1985 and 1994, is on a roll this spring. Since April 20, he has won with eight of the nine horses he has saddled in New York and was beaten a neck in the one race he lost. He is 4 for 4 at Belmont Park through Friday's card.
SAN MATEO, Calif. - Phaenna, who finished third to Grade 1 winner Lazy Slusan in the B Thoughtful at Hollywood Park on April 28, rates as the one to beat when she goes in the $50,000 Sunnyvale Handicap at Bay Meadows on Sunday.
Six entered the Sunnyvale, a six-furlong race for fillies and mares, 3 and up.
Phaenna, a speedster from the Ed Moger Jr. stable, has won eight of her 21 career starts, and will go over the $300,000 plateau in earnings with a first- or second-place finish Sunday. She comes into the race at $292,164.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - General Challenge, one of the nation's top older horses last year, has resumed training at Santa Anita under trainer Bob Baffert.
A 5-year-old owned by John and Betty Mabee's Golden Eagle Farm, General Challenge won the $1 million Santa Anita Handicap in 2000, but has not started since finishing fourth in the Pacific Classic last August, a race he won as a 3-year-old in 1999.
BOSTON - Buddy Delp and Graham Motion have horses stabled one barn apart, both in Delaware and Maryland. But on Saturday the two friends will be in Boston, where they will watch the best horses in their stables, Include and Broken Vow, start one stall apart in the $500,000, Grade 2 Massachusetts Handicap, Suffolk Downs's marquee event, which drew a field of seven including three-time Grade 1 winner Sir Bear.
Delp and Motion have kidded each other since it became apparent they were both pointing their handicap stars for the 1 1/8-mile Mass Cap.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Pat Day became just the third jockey in North American racing history to win 8,000 races Thursday, hitting the milestone by winning the sixth race at Churchill Downs aboard Camden Park. He added another victory to his resume by winning the eighth race aboard Elite Mercedes. Both horses are trained by Elliott Walden.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Trainer Warren Stute opened a Hollywood Park program on Thursday and checked the morning line on one of his runners. He was not happy to find his starter listed as an outsider.
"They're usually right," he said.
"But yesterday, I ran a longshot and I fooled them. I had a horse picked last, and I finished fifth in a seven-horse field. I've found the 4-5 shots run so much better than the 20-1's," he said with a grin.
On Saturday, Stute gets his wish for a short-priced favorite when he sends Go Go in the $100,000 Desert Stormer Handicap.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Tom Amoss might be agonizing unnecessarily, but that's what top trainers tend to do. Amoss is concerned that 1 3/8 miles might be a tad too short for Williams News, the topweight and likely favorite in the $100,000 Louisville Handicap.
"A mile and a half is his perfect distance," said Amoss. "It seems like whenever he goes shorter, his punch isn't quite as effective."
