Racing resumes Wednesday at Canterbury Park after a nine-day break during which the Minnesota track hosted the Twin Cities Summer Jam, the track announced.
There are 29 days remaining of the 65-date season. Officials said handle has been up nearly 13 percent through the first portion of the meet. Field size through the first 36 dates of the meet has averaged 7.2 horses a race and daily purses have averaged $235,237.
The Indiana breeding program received a boost July 15 when the Indiana Racing Commission approved a proposal by the Indiana Thoroughbred Breed Development to return purses for statebred and state-sired stakes to a minimum of $100,000.
Lone Star Park has asked the Texas Racing Commission for approval to start its Thoroughbred meet a week later in 2022. The track is seeking to race 48 dates, the same as in 2021.
Lone Star would like to open April 28 and race through July 24, said Matt Vance, executive vice president of both Lone Star and its sister track Remington Park.
Vance said Lone Star also is looking to race Thursday through Sunday most weeks, with night racing on Thursday and Friday and afternoon cards on Saturday and Sunday.
Tengo Mis Papeles established himself as the dominant 2-year-old during the Lone Star Park meet and now he’s taking his show to Prairie Meadows. Trainer Bret Calhoun said Monday that the unbeaten colt is being pointed for the $100,000 Prairie Gold Juvenile on Aug. 14.
Tengo Mis Papeles won his career debut in the $75,000 Staunch Avenger division of the Texas Stallion Stakes on June 13 at Lone Star. In his only other start, the Texas-bred captured a division of the track’s $100,000 Texas Thoroughbred Futurity on July 10.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Trainer Mike Maker wasted no time having an impact on the Del Mar summer meeting.
Maker has a stable based in California for the first time at Del Mar and won with two of five runners on July 17-18.
“I hope we can keep it up,” Maker said last week.
DEL MAR, Calif. – In the post parade for Sunday’s second race at Del Mar, the 2-year-old colt Murray was sending mixed signals to jockey Flavien Prat in advance of his first start.
“I didn’t know what to expect because he was so relaxed,” Prat said. “It can go both ways. They can be focused or they can be lost.”
Murray, it turned out, had his act together. Murray stalked pacesetter Drink the Wind to the turn before pulling clear for a win by 10 3/4 lengths. Murray ran 5 1/2 furlongs in 1:04.37. He earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 78.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Gamine, the champion female sprinter of 2020, will start in the Grade 1 Ballerina Stakes for fillies and mares at Saratoga on Aug. 28, trainer Bob Baffert said on Sunday.
The $500,000 Ballerina Stakes is run at seven furlongs and will be the fourth start of the year for Gamine, who has won her last four races beginning with the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint at Keeneland last year.
DEL MAR, Calif. – C Z Rocket worked five furlongs at Del Mar in 1:01.60 on Sunday morning, a slow time for a gelding who has won four sprint stakes and finished second in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint at Keeneland last November.
Trainer Peter Miller timed C Z Rocket in an even slower 1:02 and did not care one bit.
“I don’t want a quick time,” Miller said. “We’ll save it for the afternoon.”
DEL MAR, Calif. - Madone needed a career-best effort to end Going Global’s five-race winning streak in a thrilling running of the Grade 2 San Clemente Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at a mile on turf at Del Mar on Saturday.
With a wide rally, Madone held off a determined Going Global to win by a half-length for her fourth career stakes win.
The rematch will occur on Aug. 21 in the Grade 1 Del Mar Oaks at 1 1/8 miles on turf, a $300,000 race that the fillies’ respective trainers were looking forward to on Sunday morning.
DEL MAR, Calif. - It was mission accomplished for United after the 6-year-old gelding won the Grade 2 Eddie Read Stakes on turf for the second consecutive year at Del Mar on Saturday.
Now comes the tricky part of trying to win the Grade 2 Del Mar Handicap on Aug. 21 for the first time in an effort to gain a fees-paid berth for a possible third appearance in the Breeders’ Cup Turf here on Nov. 6.
