LOUISVILLE, Ky. – It is perhaps the most compelling storyline of the 138th Preakness Stakes, this inextricable entanglement of Orb, Departing, and their respective connections.
The horses spent their early days together in the same paddock at Claiborne Farm in Paris, Ky., and after going their separate ways for a time, they will reunite May 18 for a date with racing destiny in the Preakness at Pimlico in Baltimore.
William Hill, the British bookmaking company, has reached an agreement with Monmouth Park in New Jersey to sponsor the track’s Haskell Invitational Stakes and manage a sports-betting operation at the track if legal barriers to sports betting are lifted, Monmouth announced Tuesday.
A release from Monmouth said that the agreement is “long term” but it did not provide details. The $1 million Haskell, a mid-summer target for many top 3-year-olds, is scheduled this year for July 28, and it will be renamed the William Hill Haskell Invitational.
Groupie Doll, the 2012 Eclipse female sprint champion, had her first day at Churchill Downs on Tuesday since getting several months off when jogging two miles with Jada Schlenk aboard.
“We brought her in yesterday after all the Derby hoopla was over,” said Buff Bradley, who trains and co-owns the 5-year-old mare with his father, Fred. “Jada said she felt great.”
Groupie Doll had been at the Bradleys’ Indian Ridge Farm since being sent home in early February from Florida, where she was not training to Bradley’s satisfaction.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The customary parting gift left behind by Kentucky Derby tourists is $303,033, a tidy sum for which everyday horseplayers at Churchill Downs are once again grateful.
Thursday will mark the 10th time in the last 12 years that a major carryover has resulted from the Derby. In preceding years, it was the pick six that eluded Derby bettors, but for the second straight year, it is the last-race super high five offering a potential bonanza.
Post time for the ninth and last race Thursday is 4:59 p.m. Eastern.
Trainer Al Stall Jr. said Bind has been retired after finishing last of nine behind Golden Ticket in a Thursday allowance.
“He’s fine,” Stall said. “It just seems like he doesn’t want to do it anymore, and we’re not going to make him.”
INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Broadway Empire won his debut in a six-furlong race for maidens by 16 1/2 lengths and earned a 97 Beyer Speed Figure – at Turf Paradise on a Monday in March.
The Phoenix track is not known for producing fast maiden race winners on weekdays, or on any day for that matter, making Broadway Empire’s performance even more stunning.
More will be known about the gelding’s true ability when he makes his stakes debut in the $70,000 Came Home Stakes for 3-year-olds over seven furlongs at Betfair Hollywood Park on Saturday.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Handicappers overestimated Esentepe during the winter-spring meet at Santa Anita, where the European import lost twice as the favorite in turf allowances.
Thursday at Betfair Hollywood Park, she changes surfaces while trying to avoid being labeled a classic underachiever. Esentepe tops the race-7 feature, a main-track allowance that is the richest on the card but from a wagering perspective the least attractive.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Midnight Lucky, fifth in the Kentucky Oaks at Churchill Downs last Friday, will be pointed to the $300,000 Acorn Stakes for 3-year-old fillies over a mile at Belmont Park on May 27, according to trainer Bob Baffert.
Owned by Mike Pegram, Karl Watson, and Paul Weitman, Midnight Lucky was beaten for the first time in her three-race career in the Kentucky Oaks, finishing nine lengths behind upset winner Princess of Sylmar.
While his former boss, trainer D. Wayne Lukas, and other colleagues make plans for Pimlico, trainer Dallas Stewart is enjoying the afterglow of a Derby in which he saddled the longshot runner-up, Golden Soul.
Stewart said he was “as proud as can be” of the way Golden Soul closed in the final quarter-mile to outfinish Revolutionary, Normandy Invasion, and Mylute for the $400,000 second-place prize.
“Nobody was going to beat the winner [Orb], not the way he ran,” Stewart said. “For a horse who wasn’t even supposed to make the race, we had a pretty good result.”
Golden Gate Fields general manager Joe Morris likes to be in the thick of the action, and he’ll have plenty of action in his new job as president of the Thoroughbred Owners of California. Morris will assume his new role June 16 after the end of the current Golden Gate Fields meeting.
