Animal-rights protesters, some chained together on the racetrack, disrupted racing and COVID-19 vaccinations on Thursday at Golden Gate Fields.

A group called Direct Action Everywhere set up pickets around the track, and four members chained themselves together and lay down on the track near the five-sixteenths pole at noon, about 45 minutes before the first race. The people on the track also set off purple smoke flares, while another group of protesters waved signs near the entrance that said, “Shut Down Golden Gate Fields.”

It might be the wrong surface, but it’s the right time for Silver Dust to start his 7-year-old season. He goes back to the turf in the featured eighth race Sunday at Fair Grounds.

Silver Dust, who won the Grade 3 Mineshaft Stakes last winter at Fair Grounds and has banked nearly $900,000 in purse earnings, last was seen finishing a disappointing 10th in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile. He got a winter break and hit the work tab on Jan. 9 at Fair Grounds, but trainer Bret Calhoun has struggled to find a suitable spot for Silver Dust.

Yaupon, last seen finishing eighth as the favorite in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint, will start his 2021 season in the Group 1, $1.5 million Dubai Golden Shaheen on March 27 at Meydan Racecourse, trainer Steve Asmussen said Thursday.

When soon-to-be Hall of Fame trainer Todd Pletcher won his first and only Muniz Memorial Stakes, the year was 2010 and the race was called the Mervin Muniz Handicap. The winner was Blues Street, who had hit the hottest streak of his career, which in the end stamped him more as a solid listed-stakes or Grade 3-type middle-distance turf horse.

Stakes purses at the Del Mar summer meeting will more closely resemble prize money levels at the 2019 season than the 2020 season which was affected by the coronavirus pandemic, according to a schedule released by the track Thursday.

Del Mar has scheduled 39 stakes worth $7.15 million this summer, compared to 40 stakes worth $7.31 million in 2019 and 39 such races worth $5.25 million in 2020.

Fair Grounds on Wednesday announced a 10 percent across-the-board purse increase for the last 13 cards of its 2020-21 race meet. The increase, spurred by strong simulcast handle, according to a news release, is the third of the season and goes into effect March 11.

Fair Grounds also has added a card on Wednesday, March 24, to make up for a program lost to weather on Feb. 13.

Finally, first post for the March 20 Louisiana Derby card has been moved back to 11:20 a.m. Central from noon in order to accommodate NBC, which will broadcast the Louisiana Derby.
 

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Lake Avenue returns to the site of her victory in the Grade 2 Demoiselle Stakes in 2019 when she heads a field of seven entered in Saturday’s $125,000 Heavenly Prize Invitational going a one-turn mile.

Lake Avenue went winless in four starts at age 3, including a fourth-place finish as the 4-5 favorite in the Busher Invitational here last March. She is already ahead of the game at 4 with an allowance win going seven furlongs at Gulfstream on Feb. 3.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Share the Ride has hardly been slowed by a quarter crack this winter.

Share the Ride, winner of the Fall Highweight at Aqueduct in November and the General George Stakes two weeks ago at Laurel Park, will seek a third Grade 3 stakes victory when he starts as the 124-pound highweight in Saturday’s Tom Fool Stakes at Aqueduct.

In New York, Share the Ride starts under trainer Antonio Arriaga’s name. Outside of New York, he runs for trainer Miguel Penaloza, who oversees the gelding’s training at Parx Racing.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – An equipment change helped Wipe the Slate achieve his first career victory. Trainer Doug O’Neill hopes another change will help the 3-year-old get his second one.

O’Neill will remove the blinkers from Wipe the Slate’s equipment when he runs in Saturday’s Grade 3, $300,000 Gotham Stakes at Aqueduct. Wipe the Slate will attempt to rebound from a last-place finish in the Grade 3 Robert Lewis on Jan. 30 at Santa Anita.

The longshot Major Cabbie will be trainer Peter Miller’s lone starter in Saturday’s Grade 2 San Carlos Stakes at Santa Anita at a time when his stable has depth in the sprint division.

Major Cabbie has not started since a last-place finish in the Native Dancer Stakes at Laurel Park in December 2019, missing 2020 because of a splint bone injury, Miller said. Major Cabbie was in training briefly in early 2020 and resumed workouts in December.