ELMONT, N.Y. – Saturday’s Belmont Stakes program is going to be the last day for John Velazquez in the United States for about two weeks.
On Sunday, Velazquez was to start a three-day suspension stemming from a ride on Following Sea in his debut race on March 6 at Santa Anita. Velazquez was cited for “crossing over without sufficient clearance and causing interference,” which resulted in the disqualification of Following Sea from second to third.
ELMONT, N.Y. – Trainer Todd Pletcher won the featured Grade 3 Wonder Again Stakes on Thursday at Belmont Park, but it was a horse who won earlier on the card for him that stole the show.
Following Sea, a 3-year-old son of Runhappy, won a first-level allowance race by 6 1/2 lengths, covering the distance in 1:15.28 and earning a career-best 100 Beyer Speed Figure.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – At long last, the dream became reality. Just as he had envisioned thousands of times before, Chase Miller passed the eighth pole atop a speeding Thoroughbred on his way to winning a race.
“Aahhh, man!” Miller exclaimed early Friday after winning the fourth race Thursday evening at Churchill Downs aboard a filly named Bethy. “It was indescribable, really.”
Miller was doused shortly afterward by his fellow jockeys with water, eggs, and baby powder. That’s a decades-long racetrack tradition for any rider following his first win.
ELMONT, N.Y. - Irad Ortiz Jr., the three-time reigning Eclipse Award winning jockey, will miss approximately two weeks of action as the result of injuries suffered in a spill during the running of Thursday’s fifth race at Belmont Park.
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas – Warrant became a stakes winner in the $300,000 Texas Derby on Monday, when he got up by three-quarters of a length. Warrant earned a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 90 in his second two-turn start following a runner-up finish in the $300,000 Oaklawn Stakes on May 1.
“He was very impressive,” said Brad Cox, who trains Warrant for Twin Creek Racing Stables. “He seems to continue to move forward. We always thought he was a horse that would like more ground.
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas – C Z Rocket was the favorite in Lone Star Park’s Sexton Mile and in the aftermath of the race the horse was found to have lost one of his front shoes, trainer Peter Miller said Tuesday.
C Z Rocket flew home to his San Luis Rey Downs training center base in Southern California on Wednesday, and he could see action next at Del Mar. Miller said a possible next race for the horse is the Grade 1, $300,000 Bing Crosby on July 31. The six-furlong race is a qualifier for the Breeders’ Cup Sprint.
GRAND PRAIRIE, Texas – Mo Mosa will likely summer at Del Mar after running the best race of his career last Monday in the Grade 3, $400,000 Steve Sexton Mile at rain-soaked Lone Star Park.
“He liked the Texas mud,” said Mike Maker, who trains Mo Mosa. “We brought him back to Kentucky, and it looks like we might take him to California for the summer, for the Del Mar meet.”
ELMONT, N.Y. – Jockey Irad Ortiz Jr. was taken to a Long Island hospital after he was unseated by his mount, Equal Pay, in Thursday’s fifth race at Belmont Park.
Equal Pay, a first-time starter by Quality Road trained by Chad Brown, had just taken command of the 6 1/2-furlong maiden race when she propped at the three-sixteenths pole and catapulted Ortiz out of the saddle. After landing hard on the dirt course, it appeared Ortiz was clipped in the upper body by Brook’s Edge, ridden by Junior Alvarado.
Trevor Denman is returning to the microphone at Del Mar this summer after a one-year hiatus.
Denman was absent in 2020 because of the pandemic, remaining at his year-round home in Minnesota. The track announced his return in a statement released on Thursday.
Denman, 68, will describe the action during the summer meeting, which runs from July 16 to Sept. 6, and again at the autumn meeting in November.
Richard Vega, a longtime trainer on the Pennsylvania racing circuit, has been summarily suspended by the state’s racing commission after a search of his barn at Parx Racing outside Philadelphia yielded “multiple loaded needles and syringes,” according to a ruling from the Pennsylvania Horse Racing Commission.
Vega’s request for a stay of the summary suspension was denied three days after the initial ruling, according to a separate notice, which said that the Parx board of stewards “affirmed” the suspension “after considering all testimony and evidence presented” on May 27.
