Jazzin’ Okie will be giving up recency on Monday when she makes her first start in more than five months in the $55,000 Cherokee Casino Distaff Sprint at Will Rogers Downs. But what she lacks in recency, she makes up for in class.
Jazzin’ Okie is one of just two stakes winners in the six-furlong race for Oklahoma-bred fillies and mares. The other is Lady Jensen.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Jockey David Flores will ride Mizdirection in Saturday’s $100,000 Las Cienegas Stakes at Santa Anita as a one-race replacement for regular rider Mike Smith, trainer Mike Puype said.
Flores rode Mizdirection to a half-length victory in the Las Cienegas in April 2012, when the race was moved from turf to dirt because of wet weather. Smith has ridden Mizdirection in her last three starts, including a win in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint here last November. He is booked to ride War Academy in the $1 million Arkansas Derby at Oaklawn Park next Saturday.
Four of the six horses entered in Tuesday night’s $29,000 allowance feature at Charles Town last raced 4 1/2 furlongs on the West Virginia track’s March 13 card. Of that group, Just Fuhr Real was the only one to figure in the exacta when he got up by a neck.
But if you believe in Beyer Speed Figures, Just Fuhr Real not only did not run as fast as the horses who finished 3-4-5 three races later on that same evening, he’s also the slowest horse in Tuesday’s field going 4 1/2 furlongs in a second-level allowance also open to nonwinners of four lifetime.
Trainer Tony Dutrow appears to be holding a pair of aces for Monday’s $47,000 feature at Parx Racing. The eight-horse field for the first-level allowance at six furlongs includes Dutrow’s uncoupled entry of 3-year-olds Southern Honor and Edge of Reality.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Despite having closing day dampened by rain, the 2012-2013 Gulfstream Park meeting ended with a bang on Friday as bettors nationwide poured more than $5.2 million into a Rainbow 6 pool which totaled a record $7.24 million and rewarded winners with a $4,234.01 payoff. The entire pool, which began with a $1.9 million carryover, had to be dispersed on closing day.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Jack Milton passed his first stakes test with flying colors by holding off a fast-closing Up With the Birds for a neck victory Friday in the Grade 3, $100,000 Transylvania Stakes, the traditional opening-day feature at the Keeneland spring meet.
With John Velazquez riding for owner Gary Barber and trainer Todd Pletcher, Jack Milton returned $7.20 as a slight favorite in a field of 10 3-year-olds while making just his third career start. He surged to the lead after turning for home in the 1 1/16-mile turf race before digging in to hold off Up With the Birds.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - If you didn’t hit the Rainbow 6 at Gulfstream Park on Friday, there is another chance to hit a healthy pick six Saturday at Aqueduct.
When Silver Mast ($28.60) held off favored Stock Fund - who stumbled at the quarter pole - in Friday’s nightcap, it triggered a two-day pick six carryover of $73,432 into Saturday’s Wood Memorial card.
The Lumber Guy, the winner of the Grade 1 Vosburgh and the runner-up in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint last fall, has been sent to owner Barry Schwartz’s farm in upstate New York, trainer Mike Hushion said Friday.
The Lumber Guy had recently returned to Hushion in New York after spending the winter in Southern California with Neil Drysdale. The Lumber Guy finished seventh in both the Grade 1 Malibu and Grade 2 San Carlos. Hushion didn’t like how The Lumber Guy was training since returning to New York, and the decision was made to give him time off.
Last Gunfighter, a winner of five consecutive races, including the Grade 3 Excelsior on March 23, will be pointed to the Grade 3, $300,000 Pimlico Special on May 17, trainer Chad Brown said Friday.
Brown said he likes the eight weeks between races and feels his horse will handle the added distance. The Pimlico Special is run at 1 3/16 miles.
“We just keep going a little further in distance,” Brown said. “He’s a horse that looks like he’ll appreciate the added distance, and he seems to run really well with time in between starts. It’s a race that makes sense for us.”
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – It is officially Festival time at Oaklawn.
The field for the Grade 3, $400,000 Fantasy, which on Wednesday will be the first of eight stakes to be decided over the final week of the meet, was drawn Friday. A few hours prior, Oxbow breezed six furlongs in his final major prep for the Grade 1, $1 million Arkansas Derby. And later the same afternoon, trainer Ian Wilkes was awaiting the weights for the Grade 2, $500,000 Oaklawn Handicap, which is likely to draw his Breeders’ Cup Classic winner, Fort Larned.
