Golden Years, one of the top 3-year-olds in Maryland at the beginning of the 2015 season, will make his first start in 11 months in the eighth race at Laurel Park on Friday.
Golden Years went 3 for 4 as a 2-year-old at Laurel, winning the Marylander Stakes by more than seven lengths and the restricted Maryland Million Nursery by 1 1/2 lengths for trainer Rodney Jenkins and the Hillwood Stable of Ellen Charles.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Songbird was up early Wednesday morning at Santa Anita, reacquainting herself with the starting gate in a six-furlong workout that was her first drill since she was named champion 2-year-old filly of 2015 on Saturday night.
Songbird worked from the gate at 6:45 a.m. as trainer Jerry Hollendorfer prepares her for the Grade 2 Las Virgenes on Feb. 6. It was the filly’s first gate work since last year, when she won all four of her starts, including the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies on Oct. 31.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Kieren Fallon is busiest in the mornings these days.
A six-time champion jockey in England, Fallon works several mornings each week at Santa Anita for trainers such as Ben Cecil and Doug O’Neill, exercising horses ranging in ability from maidens to stakes runners. When training ends at 10 a.m., so do Fallon’s obligations on most racing days. Despite his remarkable achievements in Europe in the 1990s and 2000s, Fallon, 51, has been unable to find a niche as a jockey in Southern California.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Cutacorner, who was scratched from the $150,000 Smarty Jones on Monday at Oaklawn, will start as one of the top contenders in the featured eighth race here Thursday. He is part of a field of 11 3-year-olds for a $62,500 optional claimer at 1 1/16 miles that includes the Churchill Downs maiden winners Unexplained and American Dubai.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Oaklawn Park’s new announcer, Pete Aiello, was wrapping up his first week at the local mic on Monday. He is the fifth announcer in the history of the 112-year-old track and, at the age of 30, has brought a fresh energy into the booth. Aiello said he’s been thrilled with his new assignment in Hot Springs.
“I don’t want to sound cliché, but it’s been pretty amazing,” Aiello said. “Lots of horses, lots of new horses! But I think I got through it pretty well. I’m pretty happy.”
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – It’s become old hat each winter for local riders like John Velazquez, Javier Castellano, and Joel Rosario to handle the combination of luxury and angst that comes with having first call on a number of top 3-year-olds on the road to the Kentucky Derby. But that experience is a new one for jockey Corey Lanerie, who is enjoying every minute of it.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Havanna Belle won a stakes for the first time in Sunday’s $80,200 Astra Stakes for fillies and mares at 1 1/2 miles on turf. Now, trainer Phil D’Amato wants to run Havanna Belle in more distance turf stakes for fillies and mares. The problem is that such races are concentrated in the second half of the year in Southern California.
This year, Santa Anita does not plan to run the 1 1/4-mile Santa Barbara Handicap in April, as it has in past years. The stakes schedule for the spring-summer meeting from May 5 to July 10 has not been released.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Living The Life has been outstanding in sprints for fillies and mares on synthetic tracks in the last two years, having won four such stakes in California, England, and Pennsylvania. What’s missing is the same level of success on dirt.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Alto Belle, an 18 1/2-length winner of a maiden race at Aqueduct in November, heads a field of seven entered for Saturday’s $100,000 Busanda Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at Aqueduct.
The Busanda, run at a mile and 70 yards, is the first of three races on this circuit that offer qualifying points to the Kentucky Oaks on May 6 at Churchill Downs.
Alto Belle is trained by Todd Pletcher, who has won three straight and four of the last five runnings of the Busanda. In 2013, he won it with Princess of Sylmar, who went on to win the Kentucky Oaks.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – With the owners of Constellation, who won the Ruthless Stakes by 10 lengths on Sunday, having other fillies such as Nickname and Inheritance to attempt the longer races, Constellation likely will be kept sprinting. The next sprint stakes on the calendar at Aqueduct is the $125,000 Cicada at six furlongs on March 26.
