Steven J. Pini, the longtime track superintendent at Suffolk Downs and the 2009 recipient of the Sam McCracken Memorial Award for lifetime contributions to New England racing, died Sept. 1 after suffering a sudden heart attack. He was 63.
Pini had been overseeing the main track and turf course preparations as the track readies to reopen for training on Friday and 13 live races on Saturday.
Sheer Drama is settled back in at her Gulfstream Park base after winning last weekend’s Personal Ensign Stakes at Saratoga, and the plan is for her to train locally up to the Breeders’ Cup Distaff, trainer David Fawkes said Wednesday.
Sheer Drama shipped home Sunday and was scheduled to return to the track Thursday. She now has paired up Grade 1 wins, the Personal Ensign score last Saturday coming as an encore to her Delaware Handicap win July 18. Fawkes said Sheer Drama’s schedule up to the Breeders’ Cup will be the same as it was for the Personal Ensign.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Ceisteach, the winner of the Grade 3 Robert G. Dick Memorial at Delaware in her last start, drew post 4 and heads a field of nine entered in Saturday’s Grade 3, $200,000 Glens Falls Stakes for fillies and mares at 1 3/8 miles.
Ceisteach, trained by Tom Proctor for Glen Hill Farm and Hill ‘n’ Dale Equine, also won the Keertana Stakes at this 1 3/8-mile distance at Churchill on May 16.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Chad Brown will send out the trio of Takeover Target, Money Multiplier, and Winter Springs in a field of eight entered for Saturday’s Grade 3, $300,000 Saranac Stakes for 3-year-olds going 1 1/8 miles on turf.
Takeover Target, who drew post 2, is coming off a win in the Grade 2 National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame Stakes on Aug. 7, his third win from five career starts. Winter Springs, in his U.S. debut, finished sixth, beaten 4 1/4 lengths, in the Hall of Fame.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Saturday will mark exactly six years since Rachel Alexandra gave trainer Steve Asmussen one of his biggest victories when she defeated the boys in the Grade 1 Woodward Stakes at Saratoga.
“I don’t wait for one day a year to think about that race, I think about it all the time,” Asmussen said.
On Saturday, in a bit of irony, Asmussen will send out Constellation against Rachel Alexandra’s second foal, Rachel’s Valentina, in the Grade 1, $350,000 Spinaway Stakes at Saratoga.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Judy the Beauty, the champion female sprinter of 2014, will not start Sunday in the $80,000 CERF Stakes at Del Mar, trainer Wesley Ward said in a text message Wednesday.
Ward said Judy the Beauty will remain with his stable at Keeneland. He did not state a short-term race goal, although the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint at Keeneland on Oct. 31 is a long-term goal. Judy the Beauty won the 2014 BC Filly and Mare Sprint at Santa Anita.
Colby Hernandez, the second-leading rider in North America in wins this year, is named on four mounts Saturday at Ellis in starting what will be several weeks of action in Kentucky.
Hernandez, 26, normally rides in Louisiana, but with Evangeline Downs having closed its meet, “Colby wanted to visit with his brother [jockey Brian Hernandez Jr.] and hopefully build some business for when Fair Grounds starts in November,” said agent Anthony Martin.
Through Tuesday, Hernandez trailed only Javier Castellano in wins, 239-235. Antonio Gallardo is next with 233.
VANCOUVER, British Columbia – Academic will try to become the first filly to win the Grade 3, $250,000 British Columbia Derby since Ali Miss won the richest race in western Canada in 1956. It was the second straight year a filly beat males in the Derby. In 1955, My Ladylove earned $2,600 for her win going 1 1/4 miles. The race has been contested over 1 1/8 miles since 1965.
The final four-day stretch of the 31-day Ellis Park meet begins Friday, with the last of four stakes, the $50,000 Cliff Guilliams Memorial, anchoring the closing-day card Monday.
Also in the condition book for Monday is the Twice Around, although it’s not a certainty to be run. The 2 1/4-mile race has failed to fill more often than not in recent years, although Ellis racing secretary Dan Bork said he is hopeful the $7,500 claiming race will attract a sufficient number of entries this year.
