OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Todd Pletcher may have lost one top contender for Saturday’s Grade 1 Wood Memorial at Aqueduct when Far From Over got hurt, but he still has another big chance to win the $1 million race with Daredevil.
Daredevil, last year’s Grade 1 Champagne Stakes winner, was one of seven 3-year-olds entered Wednesday for the Wood Memorial, the last of four races for 3-year-olds hosted by Aqueduct on the road to the May 2 Kentucky Derby.
ARCADIA, Calif. – The first time Cliff Sise Jr. sat on a horse, it flipped over on him. Sise was 6. The horse was a Shetland pony. The second time Sise sat on a horse, in a neighbor’s backyard one year later, he rode right into a clothesline and was knocked off.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Jockey Chuck C. Lopez is living the dream – as hard as he tries not to dream at all.
Lopez is the regular rider of El Kabeir, a multiple-stakes-winning 3-year-old who is one step – or more correctly, nine furlongs – away from making it to the Kentucky Derby. Lopez, 54, has never ridden in a Kentucky Derby, and if he were somehow to win it this year, he would match Bill Shoemaker as the oldest rider to accomplish the feat. Shoemaker was 54 when he won the 1986 Derby on Ferdinand.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Far From Over, the winner of the Grade 3 Withers Stakes and among the favorites for Saturday’s Grade 1, $1 million Wood Memorial at Aqueduct, is injured and off the Kentucky Derby trail, his connections said Tuesday.
Far From Over was found with a hairline condylar fracture in his left hind leg that will require surgery to stabilize. He could return for a fall campaign, his connections said.
El Kabeir completed his preparations for Saturday’s Grade 1 Wood Memorial by working five furlongs in 1:01.12 by himself at Belmont Park. He will be one of the rare individuals to have competed in all four of Aqueduct’s winter stakes for 3-year-olds. It looks like he will face five rivals in the Wood: Daredevil, Far From Over, Frosted, Tencendur, and Toasting Master.
Top 3-year-old males at Aqueduct
California-based Bob Baffert trains the country’s two leading prospects for the Kentucky Derby – 2014 champion 2-year-old male AMERICAN PHAROAH and undefeated DORTMUND. American Pharoah romped in his March 14 comeback at Oaklawn Park, and will return to Oaklawn for the Grade 1 Arkansas Derby on April 11. Dortmund, meanwhile, is the early favorite for the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby this Saturday, April 4.
If you liked the major Kentucky Derby preps at Fair Grounds and Gulfstream in February, you got an encore performance last Saturday. International Star won again at Fair Grounds, this time in the Louisiana Derby, while at Gulfstream, a Todd Pletcher trainee defeated Upstart in a controversial running of the Florida Derby, similar to the Fountain of Youth.
Champion AMERICAN PHAROAH maintains his ranking as the leading 3-year-old at the meet for his dominating, 6 1/4- length win in the Grade 2, $750,000 Rebel on March 14 at Oaklawn. He is based in Southern California and is a candidate to return to town for the Grade 1, $1 million Arkansas Derby on April 11.
Top 3-year-old males at Oaklawn
El Kabeir, the winner of the Jerome and Gotham stakes this winter in New York, is expected to face only five horses in Saturday’s Grade 1, $1 million Wood Memorial at Aqueduct. Entries for the 1 1/8-mile Wood will be taken and post positions assigned on Wednesday.
Ocean Knight was withdrawn from consideration for the Wood after a so-so workout Monday at Palm Meadows in Florida. Thus, trainer Kiaran McLaughlin plans to run just Frosted, whose only victory came over Aqueduct’s main track, a surface on which he also finished second in the Grade 2 Remsen last fall.
