ARCADIA, Calif. – Blended Citizen was scratched from Saturday’s Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs after failing to draw into the race from the also-eligible list on Friday morning. The recent stakes winner will not be idle for long.

Trainer Doug O’Neill intends to run Blended Citizen in the Grade 3 Peter Pan Stakes at Belmont Park on May 12 as a prep for the Grade 1 Belmont Stakes at 1 1/2 miles on June 9. The $350,000 Peter Pan Stakes is run at 1 1/8 miles.

“He acts like a stamina horse,” O’Neill said. “We were hoping to have a chance in the Kentucky Derby.”

Bouncing back from a difficult winter in Florida, Edgar Prado has ridden well since returning to Maryland, consistently placing his horses in the proper spots. Through Thursday, he was 7 for 30 at Laurel Park. He also had a little win two weeks ago at Charles Town.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – The $500,000 Woodbine Oaks, for Canadian-bred 3-year-old fillies, is about a month away on June 9, and Dixie Moon will have her final prep race May 19 in the Grade 3, $125,000 Selene Stakes, trainer Catherine Day Phillips said.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Chiefswood Stable entered a different horse in each leg of last year’s Canadian Triple Crown and came away with runner-up finishes in each race, with Tiz a Slam in the Queen’s Plate, Aurora Way in the Prince of Wales Stakes, and Final Copy in the Breeders’ Stakes. The stable’s depth is on display again this year in the lead-up to the Queen’s Plate, with top contenders Neepawa and Pipers Warrior along with Rose’s Vision, who has emerged in his last two starts.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - On the first Saturday of May 2017, McCraken was in the Kentucky Derby spotlight, ultimately finishing eighth as the 6-1 fourth choice in the 20-horse field.

On the first Saturday of May 2018, McCraken will be one of three graduates of the 2017 Kentucky Derby to run in allowance races at Churchill Downs. McCraken will compete in a multi-conditioned one-mile allowance that goes as race 5.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Mendelssohn was the horse everyone was waiting to see here Thursday following his release from quarantine the previous afternoon.

The Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf winner clearly announced his presence to the crowd with a few good hollers, apparently par for the course for him, as he jogged by the grandstand with a trio of his buddies from the Aidan O’Brien barn shortly after the special Derby-Oaks training session ended around 7:45 a.m.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – This guy named Aidan O’Brien has run horses in 61 American races that weren’t on turf and come away with two lousy wins. Some trainer, hey? And his jockey, Ryan Moore? Goose eggs across the win, place, and show columns in 18 American starts that weren’t on turf.

Who do these people think they are, bringing this grandiosely named colt Mendelssohn from Ireland to race in the Kentucky Derby?

Here’s a good place to invoke a useful phrase introduced into the American lexicon by Mark Twain: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

The Grade 3, $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot, which has been a points race for the Kentucky Derby, will not be held in 2018, according to officials with Delta Downs and the Louisiana Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association. It is the second year the race has been canceled after the 2017 running was lost due to Hurricane Harvey.  

CHURCHILL DOWNS

More money plus more horses equals more better?

That’s the equation Arlington hopes holds during a 71-day racing season that commences Friday.

Through various sources – primarily an underpayment in the 2017 purse account and the restoration of Illinois Owners Awards by the state’s Department of Agriculture – Arlington could have close to $2 million more in purse money to pay out this year than in 2017. There’s a great chance that has something to do with the fact Arlington expects about 1,400 horses to be stabled on its backstretch this year compared with 1,150 in 2017.