Ride On Curlin, the Preakness runner-up who was eased in the June 7 Belmont Stakes, is being pointed to the Aug. 2 West Virginia Derby at Mountaineer, trainer Billy Gowan said this week at Churchill.
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LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The seeds planted at the Churchill Downs meet that ended Sunday are about to grow as tall as summer sunflowers for Juan Saez, the 17-year-old apprentice widely expected to be the leading rider at Ellis Park this summer.
Saez had five wins and seven seconds from 27 mounts during the final eight-day stretch at Churchill.
“This kid has lots of possibilities,” said his agent, former longtime jockey Julio Espinoza. “The way he looks on a horse has a lot of trainers talking good things about him. He sure doesn’t look like a bugboy.”
Golden Gate Fields showed a slight increase in all-sources handle for its 99-day meet in 2013-14 thanks to increases in both California and out-of-state advance-deposit wagering. All-sources handle for the meet was $302,828,453, up 0.8 percent from the 101-day meet in 2012-13.
California ADW was up 29.3 percent to $66,928,231. Out-of-state ADW was up 2.62 percent to $14,895,357.
There will a graded race on Saturday’s card at the Oak Tree at Pleasanton meet, the $47,000, Grade 3 Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan Arabian Cup. This is the third running of the race, which was the first graded stakes at Pleasanton last year, when the purse was $30,000. In 2012, the race was run with a $20,000 purse.
Seventeen 2-year-old fillies have been nominated for Saturday’s Juan Gonzalez Memorial Stakes at the Oak Tree at Pleasanton meet, while 16 2-year-olds, including four of the fillies, have been nominated for the Everett Nevin Stakes on Sunday’s closing-day card.
Nine of the fillies and 10 of the Nevin nominees are coming off wins, although none of the nominees in either race has placed in a stakes.
Racing secretary Tom Doutrich is pleased with the way the meet has been going.
A hometown hero will try to win Friday’s Oak Tree Sprint at the Oak Tree at Pleasanton meeting.
“He’s back in town,” trainer Reina Gonzalez said of Coach Bob.
Coach Bob, a 5-year-old Bertrando horse out of the unraced Gentleman’s Hope, was a $5,000 yearling purchase at the 2010 Northern California sale at the Alameda County Fairgrounds.
“We’ve had him in Pleasanton since he was a yearling,” Gonzalez said of the solid sprinter, whose career-high Beyer Speed Figure was a 102 at Golden Gate Fields in 2013.
As of Monday morning, Delaware Park stakes coordinator Lenny Rera had six probables for Saturday’s Grade 2, $300,000 Delaware Oaks. The race will be drawn Wednesday, along with three undercard stakes, and the field could change markedly between now and then.
The 1 1/16-mile Oaks heads the second most important day of the Delaware Park meet. The undercard stakes are the Grade 3, $200,000 Robert G. Dick Memorial for fillies and mares at 1 3/8 miles on the turf; and two $50,000 stakes, the Carl Hanford Memorial and the Oh Say.
The next two weekends are the highlight of the Delaware Park season. This Saturday is the Grade 2, $300,000 Delaware Oaks and July 12 is the Grade 1, $750,000 Delaware Handicap. The Delaware Handicap is expected to attract Princess of Sylmar, one of the leading older females in training.
The Delaware Oaks dates back to 1938. In recent years, the 1 1/16-mile race has established itself as an important prep for the 1 1/4-mile Alabama Stakes at Saratoga.
Between 2003 and 2010, four Delaware Oaks winners went on to win the Alabama.
Next Sunday is one of the biggest days of the Monmouth Park meeting, with both the Grade 1, $500,000 United Nations and Grade 3, $150,000 Salvator Mile on tap.
While the fields were still coming together as of Monday, here is a look at some of the possible starters, according to Monmouth Park stakes coordinator Dan Dufford:
United Nations, 1 3/8 mile on turf
ARCADIA, Calif. – Santa Anita ended its spring-summer meeting on Sunday, a 38-day season that showed a 40 percent increase in all-sources handle compared with the corresponding meeting at Hollywood Park in 2013, according to chairman Keith Brackpool.
Santa Anita’s winter-spring meeting operated in its traditional time period, from Dec. 26, 2013, to April 20 of this year, before the spring-summer meeting began on April 25, replacing dates previously held by Hollywood Park, which closed last December.