HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – A pair of starter optional-claiming races highlight Friday’s nine-race program, one on dirt, the second over the Tapeta course.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Angel Penna Jr., the son of Hall of Fame trainer Angel Penna Sr., died Tuesday in Boca Raton, Fla. He was 74.

Penna had been suffering from dementia, according to a report in Thoroughbred Daily News.

Penna, a native of Argentina, won 586 races with earnings in excess of $24 million during a training career that spanned more than four decades. Penna, who campaigned exclusively in south Florida over the past 10 years, sent out his final winner, Callmesenorita, on Feb. 11, 2021, at Gulfstream Park.

The Belmont Park fall meet will again be held at Aqueduct next year, according to a 2023 racing schedule put out by the New York Racing Association on Wednesday.  

The 28-date meet will run from Sept. 14 to Oct. 29.  

NYRA conducted this year’s Belmont’s fall meet at Aqueduct due to construction of a tunnel to the infield at Belmont. There are still additional construction projects slated for Belmont, including a renovation of both turf courses and the main track, which are scheduled to begin next summer.

Claude R. “Shug” McGaughey, a Hall of Fame trainer, has been suspended 15 days for a post-race positive for acepromazine, a regulated tranquilizer, in a horse that finished second in a stakes race at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., this summer, according to a Kentucky stewards ruling.

Jockey Tyler Baze plans to winter at the Oaklawn Park meet that opens Dec. 9, said Jay Fedor, the Midwest-based agent who will have his book at the Hot Springs, Ark., track. Fedor said Baze is scheduled to arrive in Arkansas on Nov. 29. 

Baze is currently riding at Del Mar in Southern California. 

“He loved it here when he was here a couple of years ago,” Fedor said. “He’s a top rider, a lot of background to him.” 

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Jockey Trevor McCarthy will be out of action 8 to 10 weeks after suffering a broken collarbone and pelvic fracture after being involved in a spill during the running of last Friday’s sixth race at Aqueduct.

The good news is that both fractures are non-displaced so McCarthy will not need surgery, “just time and rest to heal,” according to his agent Joey Migliore.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The top challengers to Kentucky Derby winner Rich Strike all squeezed in their final pre-race workouts over the weekend, preparing for their clash Friday at Churchill Downs in the $750,000 Clark, one of the final Grade 1 races of the year in North America.

The New York stewards have suspended jockey Jalon Samuel for seven racing days for his ride aboard Rhombique in last Friday’s sixth race at Aqueduct, a race in which jockey Trevor McCarthy was unseated and suffered a broken collarbone and a pelvic injury that will sideline him indefinitely.

The exact days that Samuel will serve the penalty have not yet been solidified as the stewards were waiting to hear back from Samuel as to whether he planned to appeal. Samuel on Sunday told Daily Racing Form he doesn’t plan to appeal.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Kathleen O., who won her first four races before finishing fifth in the Kentucky Oaks in May, will return to the races in Friday’s Grade 3, $175,000 Comely Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at Aqueduct.

The Comely, run at 1 1/8 miles, is one of four stakes on Friday’s nine-race card, which follows four dark days at Aqueduct. There is no racing - or training - scheduled for Thanksgiving Day.

The Southern California-based trainer Peter Miller plans to have a division of horses this winter at Oaklawn Park. The Hot Springs, Ark., track opens Dec. 9.

“We’re going to bring a small string after the Del Mar meet finishes up, and we’re looking forward to it,” Miller said last week. “I think we’ll have right about 15 horses there.”

The current Del Mar meet closes Dec. 4.