Goldencents, winner of the 2013 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile last November, worked six furlongs in 1:11.60 at Santa Anita on Wednesday.
Trained by Doug O’Neill, Goldencents will run in the $1.25 million Metropolitan Handicap at Belmont Park on June 7, part of the Belmont Stakes undercard.
Goldencents started Wednesday’s workout 5 1/2 furlongs from the finish and ran a sixteenth of a mile past the wire. Santa Anita clockers timed Goldencents in 23.20 seconds for the final quarter-mile.
Storm Fighter will be the colt to catch in Saturday’s $200,000 Californian Stakes, a race that could lead to an appearance in the $500,000 Gold Cup at Santa Anita on June 28.
Trained by Bruce Headley for Golden Eagle Farm, the 4-year-old Storm Fighter is in outstanding form, having won his last two starts over a mile – an optional claimer on April 5 and the Tiznow Stakes for California-breds on April 26.
Ide Be Cool, who was named the 2013 Louisiana-bred horse of the year on Saturday, is a long-term prospect for the $100,000 Prelude at Louisiana Downs on Aug. 2, said his owner and trainer, Ray Dunn.
Ide Be Cool, who is undefeated in six starts, is the star of a 32-horse stable Dunn has at the Bossier City, La., track. Ide Be Cool last raced on March 1, and won the $100,000 Pelican, a 7 1/2-furlong race run around two turns at Delta Downs.
Grand Contender gave his owner, Maggi Moss, and his trainer, Tom Amoss, something to think about over the holiday weekend, when he won beyond a mile for the first time in his career in the Grade 3, $200,000 Lone Star Park Handicap.
Until Monday’s race, the horse had proven to be at his best at a mile, with all three of his stakes wins coming at the trip. But the manner in which he won the 1 1/16-mile Lone Star Handicap has opened up more options for the horse, his connections said, including the Governor’s Cup, a 1 1/8-mile race run each August at Remington Park.
ARCADIA, Calif. – When Room Service takes a liking to a surface, the results have been brilliant for the 3-year-old filly.
Room Service thrived on turf at Gulfstream Park in March, winning the Grade 3 Herecomesthebride Stakes. She took a fancy to Keeneland’s Polytrack surface in early April, winning the Grade 1 Ashland Stakes in a dead heat with Rosalind.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Wednesday morning was a quiet one at Belmont Park and a good time to get reacquainted with some old friends from the Kentucky Derby trail, as well as a couple of new faces in this year’s Belmont Stakes mix.
California Chrome and Tonalist were the first of the five potential Belmont starters to gallop over the main track between 6 and 7:15 a.m. Wednesday. They were followed by Ride On Curlin, Social Inclusion – whose Belmont status remains uncertain – and Wicked Strong. Those five are likely to be the top choices, if they all start, in the June 7 Belmont Stakes.
Ria Antonia has resumed training at Churchill but has “no definite race” on her agenda, said trainer Tom Amoss. Ria Antonia was badly beaten as the lone filly in the May 17 Preakness when making her first start for Amoss, her fourth trainer.
Meanwhile, Amoss figures to have the horse to beat Saturday with Delaunay in the Grade 3, $100,000 Aristides Stakes. Delaunay comes off a fifth-place finish in the Grade 2 Churchill Downs Stakes on Kentucky Derby Day.
“He’s trained well since then, and we look forward to shortening him up to six furlongs,” said Amoss.
The so-called “match race” that resulted from four horses being scratched from the first race Monday at Churchill was not the first for Larry Collmus in more than 25 years of race-calling.
“I guess I’ve had maybe four or five,” said Collmus. “One of them was actually planned at Suffolk years ago. The others all scratched down like this one did.”
Theodore’s Cash won the Monday opener by three lengths over Stereo in Motion after the rest of the six-horse field was scratched.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Pat Byrne came within a single vote of earning the Eclipse Award for outstanding trainer in 1997, but that degree of success mostly has eluded him in the intervening years.
So no wonder Byrne has been smiling the last few days in the aftermath of a 3-year-old colt named Almost Famous breaking out with a 102 Beyer Speed Figure in an allowance romp Memorial Day weekend at Churchill Downs.
“I’m feeling really good about him,” said Byrne. “I’ve always said he’s a good colt. That kind of number is pretty hard to come by.”
In 2012 with I’ll Have Another preparing to run in the Belmont, Golden Gate Fields did a little guerrilla marketing by handing out cookies to promote the colt’s bid for the Triple Crown bid. The promotion was based on the story of the colt's name: Owner J. Paul Redham said "I'll have another" was his standard response when his wife asked him if he’d like more of the cookies she just baked.
