HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – The connections of Grade 1 winner Get Her Number will be keeping close tabs on Kentucky Derby developments leading up to the May 1 classic at Churchill Downs.
Trainer Peter Miller said Tuesday that the race is on the horse’s radar after his troubled fourth-place finish in the Arkansas Derby last Saturday. Get Her Number earned 10 points to bring his total to 20, and sat 24th on the Kentucky Derby leaderboard on Tuesday.
Volleying between grief and gratitude, trainer Wayne Potts was back at Belmont Park Wednesday morning, tending to the 52 horses of his who survived Tuesday evening’s barn fire, which took the lives of two of his horses.
“It could have been a lot worse, I could have lost everything and had nothing left,” Potts said Wednesday morning in Belmont’s barn 48, one of six barns where Potts now has horses stabled.
Round 4 of the battle between Clairiere and Travel Column in the Kentucky Oaks on April 30 will feature a new jockey for Clairiere, with trainer Steve Asmussen reporting on Tuesday night that Tyler Gaffalione had picked up the mount.
Tickets for the reopened Golden Gate Fields went on sale Monday for limited seating for the next two weeks of racing, including Gold Rush Weekend on April 24-25.
Tickets can be purchased online at www.goldengatefields.com/events/tickets. Tickets cost $15, which includes admission, a reserved seat and program. No walk-up sales are allowed.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Trainer Bret Calhoun on Monday was just starting to look over options for a spring-summer campaign for By My Standards, who went over $2 million in earnings Saturday with his nose victory in the $400,000 Oaklawn Mile.
The race was the horse’s first start since November. Calhoun said the multiple Grade 2 winner was to travel Monday to Kentucky.
“Nice comeback race for him, for sure,” said Calhoun.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Silver State has emerged as one of the top older horses this meet at Oaklawn Park and on Saturday will be seeking his fifth straight win when he chases after the track’s richest offering for his division, the Grade 2, $1 million Oaklawn Handicap.
Silver State has won his last four races in a streak that includes the $150,000 Fifth Season on Jan. 23 and the $500,000 Essex on March 13, both route races at Oaklawn. His current run started in an October allowance at Keeneland, with all of the wins coming under Ricardo Santana Jr.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Jose Ortiz took advantage of his brother Irad’s absence last week to ride 10 winners, including five on Sunday, and vault to the top of the Aqueduct standings in the abbreviated 11-day meet. Jose leads Irad, 16-12, heading into the final four days of the spring session.
Both riders will be here to complete the meet.
“You want to win every meet that you can, but Irad wasn’t here this week and I’m sure he’ll come back and be competitive next week,” Jose Ortiz told NYRA publicity following his fifth win Sunday.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Horologist, who returned from a five-month layoff to win Saturday’s $100,000 Top Flight Invitational at Aqueduct, could make her next start in the Grade 3, $150,000 Allaire duPont Distaff at Pimlico on May 14, trainer Bill Mott said Monday.
“I haven’t connected with all the connections yet, but that’s a good spot timing-wise,” Mott said.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Maracuja ran well enough in the Grade 3 Gazelle to warrant consideration for the Kentucky Oaks, and trainer Rob Atras will let her convince him to take her there when she returns to the work tab later this week.
“Right now we’re planning on going, if things aren’t 100 percent with her then we won’t do it,” Atras said.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Weyburn, the Grade 3 Gotham winner and fourth-place finisher in the Grade 2 Wood Memorial, is being pointed to the Grade 3, $200,000 Peter Pan Stakes at Belmont Park on May 8 as a stepping-stone to the Belmont Stakes on June 5, his connections said Monday.
Weyburn has enough qualifying points to make the Kentucky Derby field, but trainer Jimmy Jerkens and Robert Landry, the racing manager for Robert and Mark Krembil’s Chiefswood Racing, don’t believe that’s the right race for this horse.
