A trainer stabled a few barns away from Rodolphe Brisset last winter at Fair Grounds was confused. Brisset’s horses looked great. The operation seemed to run smoothly. Where were the results?
Brisset had his first starter as a head trainer in May 2017. By year’s end, his record stood at 70-6-8-10. The winter, with Brisset split between Fair Grounds and Tampa Bay Downs, was just as slow. Between Oct. 1 and Feb. 1, only two of his 38 starters won.
CYPRESS, Calif. – Geovanni Franco, who has not ridden since June 24 because of a sprained knee, will resume riding at Del Mar on July 18, the track’s opening day of the summer meeting.
Franco, the second-leading rider at the Santa Anita spring-summer meeting, recently underwent an MRI test that revealed the sprain, according to his agent, James Giannone.
Franco exercised horses at Santa Anita on Wednesday and could have a mount at Los Alamitos on Sunday, the final day of that track’s summer meeting, Giannone said.
Roy H, the champion sprinter of 2017, and Paradise Woods, a multiple Grade 1 winner, worked at Santa Anita on Wednesday for upcoming stakes at Del Mar.
Roy H, trained by Peter Miller for Rockingham Ranch and David Bernsen, was third in the $2 million Duabi Golden Shaheen on March 31. The 6-year-old gelding is scheduled to start in the Grade 1 Bing Crosby Stakes at six furlongs at Del Mar on July 28.
Wednesday, Roy H worked five furlongs in 59.20 seconds.
Lady Lucy, a maiden race winner at Churchill Downs last month, has been transferred to California trainer Phil D’Amato after being bought for $200,000 at the Fasig-Tipton horses of racing age sale in Kentucky on Monday.
Lady Lucy, by Into Mischief, is now owned by the Little Red Feather partnership and Sam Aguilar. The filly won her second start, which came in a five-furlong race on June 15 for trainer William Connelly.
“I think she’s due to arrive in the next few days,” D’Amato said on Wednesday.
Trainer Wayne Catalano said Wednesday he would not be shipping Farrell to Delaware Park for this Saturday’s Grade 2, $750,000 Delaware Handicap.
Farrell, a confirmed front-runner, is based at Churchill Downs. A four-time Grade 2 winner, Farrell is coming off runner-up placings in the Grade 2 Fleur de Lis and the Grade 1 La Troienne at Churchill. She may have gone off the third choice in the Del Cap behind expected favorites Elate and Unbridled Mo.
Catalano said the race “looked a little cluttered” for his filly.
New York racing regulators are considering whether to weigh an appeal by supporters of the trainer Richard Dutrow to modify his 10-year ban on applying for a license, according to officials involved in the campaign.
The appeal to reconsider the penalty could be added to the agenda of the July 16 meeting of the New York Gaming Commission, according to attorney Karen Murphy, who has been coordinating an effort to modify Dutrow’s ban, five and a half years after he began serving the penalty.
Monmouth Park adds Friday racing to its calendar this week. The eight-race card will begin at 1:15 p.m. Eastern.
Race 2 is a second-level optional-claiming race on turf, race 6 is a first-level-allowance turf sprint, and race 7 is a first-level optional-claiming race at 1 1/16 miles.
The 20-cent Jersey Shore 6 has a Friday carryover of $116,514, which will be paid out when there is a single winning ticket. On Sunday, $39,537 was bet into the pool.
Jose Ferrer's six wins last Sunday gives him 35 at the meet. Paco Lopez, who started Sunday tied with Ferrer, has 29.
Coming into the racing week at Laurel Park, Wasabi Ventures Stables has won four consecutive races at the Maryland track.
Wasabi Ventures is a partnership in which investors buy shares in available stable horses. Wasabi Ventures is a co-owner in all of the horses in its program. Wasabi was founded by its managing partner, T.K. Kuegler, in 2017 and has gone 19 for 123 (15 percent).
Jessica Krupnick held on by a whisker to win a three-horse photo finish in the Dashing Beauty Stakes at Delaware Park last Saturday. The win was her first in a stakes, pushed her earnings to more than $200,000, and made her a major player in the MATCH Series.
An Uncle Mo 5-year-old, Jessica Krupnick is having her best season for Fair Hill-based horseman Tres Abbott. The stakes win was important to her owner, the Sycamore Racing V partnership, because it improved her residual value after her racing days are over.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – McCraken could make his next start in the Grade 1 Whitney on Aug. 4 at Saratoga as trainer Ian Wilkes prepares to send most of his best horses to both coasts from his Churchill Downs base.
McCraken, third as the favorite last Friday night in the Cornhusker at Prairie Meadows, will be part of a 20-horse contingent going to Saratoga.
“If everything goes well in his training, we’ll think about the Whitney,” said Wilkes.
