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Breeders’ Cup Notes: Sovereignty Ready for Classic, Distaff Contenders Put in Final Preps at Del Mar
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By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Although Cherie DeVaux sent out the first and second choices in the wagering, the trainer knew that her horses had something to prove in Saturday's GIII Lecomte Stakes at the Fair Grounds. Both Golden Tempo (Curlin) and Mesquite (Union Rags) had done nothing more than win maiden races and both seemed to be horses that still needed time to mature and develop. That may still be the case. But after Golden Tempo and Mesquite ran one-two, with Golden Tempo winning by three-quarters of a length, DeVaux knows she has two horses that are stakes quality colts who are likely to get better. “I don't feel either one of them is even close to their top yet,” said DeVaux. “We have time. Going into a race like the Derby, you want them peaking at that time. Also, in these races, you always want to win, but if they run a big number then they are probably going to regress the next time they run. Showing improvement each time and getting there and winning is the best case scenario.” For the DeVaux pair, the race developed as most handicappers expected it would. Neither horse showed any early speed in their prior starts, and the story was the same in the Lecomte. In a 10-horse field, Mesquite was seventh early and Golden Tempo was ninth. Mesquite, who was six-wide on the far turn, moved first under jockey Flavien Prat, and made his way into contention in the upper stretch. Meanwhile, Golden Tempo, after weaving his way through traffic on the turn, was taken to the inside by Jose Ortiz and closed relentlessly for the win. “[Golden Tempo] broke out of the gate fine,” DeVaux said. “He just doesn't have any early foot. The most impressive aspect was that he had to go inside, had to spilt horses, and then it seemed that he idled coming down the stretch for a couple of strides. But then he kicked clear. I was really impressed with how he handled everything.” The final time for the mile-and-a-sixteenth race run over a fast track was 1:44.98. Golden Tempo earned a modest Beyer figure of 81. When the Thoro-Graph and Ragozin sheet numbers come out, Mesquite may get the better figure of the two because of his wide trip. That Golden Tempo was the 5-2 favorite, while Mesquite was the 4-1 second choice, may have had something to do with the fact that Ortiz had ridden both in their prior races and had, apparently, chosen to ride Golden Tempo. That wasn't necessarily the case. DeVaux said that Ortiz liked both horses so much that he couldn't make up his mind and left the decision up to the trainer. DeVaux said she put Ortiz on Golden Tempo for no other reason than that the jockey had ridden him in a more recent race. DeVaux said she will wait a few days before deciding on the next races for the pair, but definitely plans to keep them apart between now and a possible start in the GI Kentucky Derby. “That was the plan, to run them both back here right out of their stalls at the Fair Grounds,” she said. “We will definitely try to separate them. We will probably keep Golden Tempo here where he's only run. Mesquite has now run at three different tracks and has handled everything fine. There are plenty of races all over the country for him.” The news on Saturday at the Fair Grounds was not all positive for DeVaux. In the Silverbulletday Stakes for 3-year-old fillies, she also sent out what appeared to be a formidable pair in Atropa (Into Mischief) and White Smoke (Essential Quality). Atropa finished third as the 1-2 favorite and White Smoke finished last in the six-horse field. “I really try to forget about what happens previously and I try not to get too down,” DeVaux said. “It was not the results we wanted, for sure. The race just didn't unfold favorably for us. You take it race by race and regroup. I am trying to enjoy what we are doing and not get lost in the pressure and nervousness of it all.” Of course, it didn't take long for DeVaux's mood to lift. The Lecomte was one of her finest hours. “It was really exciting,” she said. “Everyone has Derby dreams, Oaks dreams. We all dream of participating on the biggest days of our sport. Looking back, around the middle of last summer, I knew that if we didn't have something in the Derby that I would be let down because we did have a lot of really nice, Classic-type horses. The physicals were there, the pedigrees were there, and then they all started training and checking the boxes. I like to manage my own expectations. I don't like to feel like I let myself down or take the wind out of my sails. But this has continued to be exciting. It's so exciting and it's fun to look to the future.” It's not just her 3-year-old colts that have DeVaux excited. She is the trainer of Nymue (War Front), the last foal out of the great Zenyatta, and one that has shown DeVaux unmistakable signs of talent. The 3-year-old has finally shown up on the work tab. On Friday, she breezed three furlongs at the Fair Grounds in :38.20. “Nymue has really matured physically and mentally,” DeVaux said. “She's so big that we had to give her time to let her body develop on its own timeline. I really noticed a difference in her this time around. We gave her a real easy work to start and then in her last work I put her against a colt who is on her same time -line and has the same physical constitution. She was really engaged in the work. They didn't go that fast, but she's probably not going to be that speedy by nature of who she is. She was moving really well. Physically, she has just blossomed. She's got a lot more muscle to her and a lot more condition. It was coming along during the summer, but that was lacking. She's finally starting to get there. But she is a June foal. Patience has always been the key with her.” DeVaux said that she is hopeful that Nymue will make her career debut before the end of the Fair Grounds meet on Mar. 22. The post After Landing a One-Two Punch in the Lecomte, DeVaux is Excited About Her Derby Prospects appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Following a record-breaking season for the team at Cropthorne Stud in 2025, Tony Carroll has set his sights on doing it all over again in 2026. And whilst the Worcestershire trainer concedes that it won't be easy to surpass last year's impressive haul, he is understandably buoyed by a phenomenal start to January which brought 14 winners in as many days. “We had a really good December [with 16 winners] and we've been able to continue that momentum,” Carroll told the TDN on Sunday. “Things can change very quickly in this game, but the horses have stayed in good form and we've got plenty of runners still to come [in January]. We're going to be busy all of next week. “You always need a little bit of luck, but we'll be trying our best to get as many winners as we can. We'll just keep our heads down and keep going, although you do have to enjoy the success as well. That's the most important thing, really.” Certainly, Carroll had more than his fair share to enjoy in 2025. In April, he was crowned champion trainer on the all-weather for the first time after saddling 57 winners during the winter months, including 22 in the month of January alone. By the end of the calendar year, he'd amassed 128 winners on the Flat in Britain and over £1 million in prize-money, both personal-best totals in a training career spanning three decades. “We were very proud, to be honest with you,” Carroll added of that watershed year, before quickly turning his focus back to the task at hand. “We've already gone over £100,000 in prize-money this year. We're ticking along at a fair rate of knots, so things are looking really good. “Quietly, we've always been on an upward trajectory. I think, if we could replicate last year, we would all be very, very happy. It was an incredible year for everybody.” Having saddled 38 winners so far during the qualifying period, Carroll has already gone a long way towards repeating one of his finest achievements of last year. He is currently seven ahead of Ian Williams in the race to be crowned champion trainer on the all-weather for 2025/26, with his ability to put his horses in the right spots, often with not much time between runs, enabling him to stay one step ahead of the competition. “We've got around 80 horses in the yard,” Carroll continued. “It's all about keeping them healthy and keeping them right. Placing them correctly is a big thing and the jockeys play a big role in it all as well. It's not just one particular thing. It's about having that attention to detail, from start to finish, in everything you do.” In recent weeks, the campaigning of Gogo Yubari (Havana Grey) is perhaps the best embodiment of Carroll's front-foot approach. The daughter of Havana Grey has won four of her eight starts since November, including three wins in the space of five days earlier this month. The second of those was achieved under promising young rider Harry Vigors at Lingfield on January 10, before the duo rocked up at Chelmsford the next day and repeated the dose. “She's a filly that has really come right,” said Carroll, who will see how the five-year-old is on Monday morning before deciding whether she takes up her engagement at Kempton later in the day. “The races just fell in front of her really. We've been a bit hard on her in some cases, running her back so quickly, but the races were there for her and she took them in her stride.” Only the five-time winner Aisling Oscar (Rajasinghe) is ahead of Gogo Yubari among the winningmost horses on the all-weather this winter, while Carroll's Francesi (Caravaggio) also deserves an honourable mention with three wins, a second and two thirds from his last six starts. In all of those races, Francesi was partnered by the 16-year-old Myla Coppins, one of three apprentices attached to the Carroll yard. Francesi himself only arrived there in November – on a losing run stretching back to April 2022 – since which time Coppins has played an important role in the seven-year-old rediscovering his best form, according to Carroll. He explained, “Myla Coppins has got on superbly well with him. She's only just left school and it's her first season riding. She's had a handful of rides and she's ridden four winners already. She rides him [Francesi] every day and I think she's probably been the key to him. She's got a nice style and a nice way about her – I'm sure she'll have a future.” He added, “Jack Doughty rides most of ours and is the in-house man. And then we've got Matthew Slater, Molly Gunn and Myla Coppins in the yard, all young kids who have got licences and are riding very well. They all have a chance.” As for the fresh equine talent coming through the ranks at Cropthorne Stud, Carroll is particularly excited about the prospects of the five-year-old Betsen, a 40/1 winner on his stable debut at Southwell in November. Formerly trained in Ireland by Jack Davision, the son of Invincible Spirit, a €16,000 purchase at last year's Goffs Autumn HIT Sale, will line up at Newcastle on Tuesday from a revised BHA mark of 86. “Betsen is a very nice horse,” said Carroll. “We weren't really sure what to expect at Southwell. We liked him from the day he stepped into the yard, but he'd previously worn headgear and run over all sorts of different trips. We just took him back to basics and he showed that he's very talented. He's the sort of horse you want to have in the yard and I would be hoping to land him in a race on Good Friday.” He added, “I'm always looking and always trying to find another horse. They come to us from all sorts of places. We've got some new faces in now and we're looking forward to the year ahead. We just really have to keep our heads down and concentrate on what we do have and not what we don't. Fingers crossed, we can continue what we've been doing.” The post ‘We’ve Always Been On An Upward Trajectory’ – All-Weather Maestro Tony Carroll On The March appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Two days after first being quietly unveiled at Santa Anita, the Racing on Demand slot machine-style parimutuel games-with distinct similarities to Historic Horse Racing-were removed from the track by Department of Justice law enforcement officers Saturday afternoon in a pubic operation that saw DOJ personnel wheel the machines out the back of the Santa Anita grandstand on gurneys during racing. Given the apparent abruptness of the law enforcement operation, little information was shared publicly about who and what precipitated the action. But reached briefly Sunday morning, Los Angeles Turf Club senior vice-president Scott Daruty explained that the state Attorney General's office, under Rob Bonta, gave the order. This, after the AG's office had apparently received fore-warning about the machines nearly a year ago before they were made operational. “There was no court order. There was no court action. There was no seizure warrant. This was an action of the Department of Justice under the direction of the Attorney General's office,” said Daruty. The TDN has reached out to the state AG's office and to the California DOJ's Bureau of Gambling Control for comment. This story will be updated as necessary. There had been 26 machines in total operating in the grandstand pavilion since Thursday. They offered $1 bets and required gamblers to select the first three finishers of three random six-horse previously-run races. The ultimate purpose of the machines was to provide a much-needed additional source of income for Santa Anita's purses, which have struggled to compete with other states whose purse accounts are juiced by supplemental revenue sources like HHR machines. The question had been whether the machines were legal or not without explicit approval from Tribal entities in the state who hold a lock on non-pari-mutuel wagering in California. Indeed, a politically powerful Tribal entity told the LA Times Thursday that they would have a “full throated” response to machines going in at Santa Anita, arguing that they violate the tribal compact on gambling. When asked if there were other political forces that had swayed yesterday's action by the state AG's office, Daruty pointed to this sway that Tribal entities wield. “What exactly triggered the actions yesterday? I don't know. However, I will say that anybody who keeps an eye on California politics knows how much money the Tribes spend and knows how, let's say, influential they can be to politicians,” he said. Daruty was tight-lipped Sunday morning about what the next steps would be, other than to say they would take the matter to court and that he still believed theirs was a strong case, describing the machines as “Tote” terminals. “We will be seeking a court confirmation that our view of applicable law is correct,” he said. “Based on the very limited, almost non-existent investigation they did into how those Tote terminals actually work, I think our legal position is much better than theirs. And frankly, I'm not sure they even understand that they took Tote terminals.” These remarks mirror in tone what Daruty had stated in a short statement issued Saturday evening. In it, he maintained that the terminals operated under longstanding pari-mutuel wagering laws using a wager that regulators had already approved. “Attorney General Bonta received our comprehensive legal analysis nearly a year ago. His office had ample time to raise concerns. They did not. We proceeded on solid legal ground, and since the state is choosing to challenge that now, we're fully prepared to defend ourselves. We're confident the law is clear,” Daruty wrote. While Tribal entities are a political behemoth in the state, the Tribes suffered a rare reversal of fortunes in the courts last year in their attempt to sue and ultimately shut down gambling halls called card rooms in the state. The post Daruty: Confiscation of Machines an Action “Under the Direction of the Attorney General’s Office” appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
Via Sistina, Yulong's multiple group 1-winning champion, has been retired and will return to the United Kingdom to be covered by Darley's leading stallion Dubawi.View the full article -
By Wandering Eyes · Posted
The new Maryland Jockey Club hosts the "Laurel Park February First Chance, Last Chance Handicapping Challenge," a one-day hybrid on-site or online handicapping contest taking place Feb. 14 at Laurel Park or through Xpressbet and TVG/4NJBETS.View the full article
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