Jack Disney, a former sportswriter, racing publicist, and stakes-winning horse owner, died after a lengthy illness on Monday, his friends said. Disney was 80 and had been in failing health.

The 19-year-old jockey Ricardo Gonzalez is becoming the go-to guy in big races on the Northern California racing circuit.

Gonzalez won the biggest races for older horses at the recently concluded Golden Gate Fields meeting, guiding G. G. Ryder to wins in the Grade 3 San Francisco Mile on turf and Grade 3 All American on the main track.

CYPRESS, Calif. – The 1,380-foot stretch at Los Alamitos is the longest in the nation, and can sometimes be a test for more than the horses.

Turning for home, horses have a few strides before they reach the quarter pole, leaving jockeys to judge the appropriate time to ask for maximum run. Opinions differ on the best way to ride the track.

“You have to stay in striking distance,” said jockey Drayden Van Dyke. “It’s hard to make up ground with the long stretch.”

OPELOUSAS, La. – Louisiana’s best are all set to go Saturday at Evangeline Downs for the annual Louisiana Legends Night program. A total of eight stakes restricted to horses bred in the Bayou State will be worth $775,000. All divisions will be represented except for 2-year-olds, who will have center stage to themselves July 11, when the two divisions of the $100,000 D.S. “Shine” Young Futurity will be contested.

CYPRESS, Calif. – The first two weeks of July would seem an ideal time to run a Thoroughbred meeting in Southern California. School is out, the Fourth of July weekend looms, and the weather is fine.

But in early July, the countdown is underway for the start of the Del Mar meeting on July 16, and that threatens to overshadow the eight-day Los Alamitos summer meeting, which begins Thursday.

Wise Dan has begun daily galloping at his home base of Keeneland in Lexington, Ky., as trainer Charlie LoPresti begins thinking about a possible next race for the two-time Horse of the Year.

Wise Dan had been on a 30-day schedule of alternating between jogging and galloping until being cleared last weekend by veterinary staff at the Rood & Riddle Equine Hospital to resume full-blown training on the main track at Keeneland.

Embattled trainer Juan Vazquez has been indefinitely barred from the grounds of Delaware Park.

William Fasy, the president of Delaware Park, confirmed on Monday that Vazquez had been barred from the track as of last Thursday. Fasy declined to give a reason why Vazquez, a three-time leading trainer at Delaware, had been barred.

“Juan Vazquez has been barred from Delaware Park but I have no comment on the reason why,” he said.

Vazquez’s attorney, Alan Pincus, said that he was informed that Vazquez had been banned but was also not given a reason why.

FRANKFORT, KY. - A pair of races for jumpers will be added to the Sept. 5 opening day card at Kentucky Downs, following unanimous approval Monday from the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission.

The $40,000 Sport of Kings Maiden Hurdle for 4-year-old and up steeplechase maidens will be held over 2 1/4 miles on the Kentucky Downs undulating turf course. It will be contested as a non-parimutuel event under the rules of the National Steeplechase Association, and the purse for the race will come from the Kentucky Downs operating account.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Kirk Ziadie, Gulfstream Park’s leading trainer during the 2015 spring meet, may not be able to continue training his horses when the summer session begins Wednesday because of licensing issues with the state of Florida.

With the fiscal year in Florida and the spring meet ending Tuesday, all parimutuel employees must reapply for a new license beginning Wednesday. Ziadie reapplied for his 2015 license in May, but as of Monday the Florida Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering had yet to act on his renewal.

Keeneland’s usually power-packed fall stakes schedule takes on even more importance this year when the track presents 23 stakes in anticipation of the first Breeders’ Cup held at the Lexington track on Oct. 30 and 31.