DEL MAR, Calif. – Grade 1 winner Improbable worked an easy five furlongs Sunday morning at Del Mar, as trainer Bob Baffert considers summer options for the 4-year-old who scored a resounding victory last month in the Hollywood Gold Cup at Santa Anita.
Improbable worked a slow 1:03.80 in his first Del Mar work since arriving from Santa Anita.
“We’re keeping him fresh, we don’t want to do too much,” Baffert said. “We want him ready for the Breeders’ Cup.”
DEL MAR, Calif. – Abel Cedillo has been named as replacement rider for Maximum Security, who will make his California debut and first start for trainer Bob Baffert in the Grade 2 San Diego Handicap on Saturday at Del Mar.
“It’s a one-shot deal,” Baffert said regarding jockey assignment.
Maximum Security’s regular rider, Luis Saez, is on the sidelines after testing positive for coronavirus. Baffert said Saez would regain the mount on Maximum Security. Meanwhile, the trainer is confident in Cedillo.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Gamine, the runaway winner of the Grade 1 Acorn Stakes at Belmont Park last month, worked a half-mile Sunday morning at Del Mar in 48.80 seconds as trainer Bob Baffert continues to map out a plan to get her to the Kentucky Oaks on Sept. 4 at Churchill Downs.
One thing he knows for sure. “She’s not going to the Coaching Club American Oaks,” Baffert said, referring to the Grade 1, 1 1/8-mile race next Saturday at Saratoga.
One race seriously under consideration is the Grade 1 Test, at seven furlongs on Aug. 8 at Saratoga.
One of the many changes to this year’s Saratoga summer is the addition of the Grade 3, $100,000 Peter Pan to the stakes schedule.
Nine 3-year-olds were entered Saturday for the Peter Pan, which will offer 85 qualifying points to the Sept. 5 Kentucky Derby to its top four finishers. The Peter Pan, run at 1 1/8 miles, shares billing with the Grade 3, $100,000 Schuylerville Stakes - a traditional Saratoga race - on Thursday’s 10-race opening-day card.
DEL MAR, Calif. - Maximum Security is all set for his first start with new trainer Bob Baffert. Now all he needs is a rider.
Maximum Security, last year’s champion 3-year-old male, completed his preparation for the Grade 2 San Diego Handicap next Saturday at Del Mar with a five-furlong work in 59.60 seconds on Saturday morning under exercise rider Juan Ochoa, a former jockey.
“He looks great. He went fantastic. He’s ready as I can get him,” Baffert said. “He looked really good.”
DEL MAR, Calif. – Jockey Victor Espinoza has tested positive for coronavirus and will be “out for a while,” his agent, Brian Beach, said Friday.
Espinoza had a test taken in San Diego County on Friday afternoon after a test he had taken on Thursday in Orange County failed to be processed in the quick time he had been promised; as of Friday night he had not received those results. Since that Orange County test had yet to come back by the start of racing Friday, Espinoza was taken off his mounts on the opening-day card at Del Mar.
DEL MAR, Calif. – Jockey Victor Espinoza was taken off his three mounts on opening day Friday at Del Mar because results of a coronavirus test that he sought out on Thursday had yet to be returned to him, according to his agent, Brian Beach.
Espinoza rode last Saturday at Los Alamitos. Both Martin Garcia and Luis Saez, who rode at Los Alamitos that day, have this week tested positive for coronavirus.
The California Horse Racing Board placed the racing license for the Los Alamitos evening meeting on a 10-day probation on Friday, ordering the track to develop immediate safety protocols following a sharp rise in fatal breakdowns in recent weeks.
In a two-hour emergency teleconference meeting, the racing board considered an immediate cessation of racing at Los Alamitos, but voted 5-1 to allow racing to continue. The evening meeting consists of racing for Quarter Horse and lower-level Thoroughbreds on a Friday-through-Sunday basis.
For the first time in more than four decades, trainer D. Wayne Lukas will not be stabled at Saratoga.
Lukas, who won six trainers’ titles at Saratoga from 1986-92, said he will keep his stable in Kentucky for the summer after much of his help expressed a desire not to go to New York because of the COVID-19 situation.
