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By Michael Guerin The queen of trotting may have two impressive last-start winners heading to Alexandra Park tonight but she thinks her rep with the worst form line might end up being the punter’s friend. Michelle Wallis and husband Bernie Hackett had a career-best season last year when training 57 winners capped by Hillbilly Blues capturing the Group 1 National Trot on New Year’s Eve. Remarkably of those 57 wins, 55 came in trotting races with the majority at Alexandra Park where it feels like the stable wins a trotting race almost every Friday. That could well be the case again tonight though Wallis and Hackett only have starters in two races on the small seven-race card. Both Magic Dash (No 1) and Confessional (No 5) were impressive last-start winners and they clash in tonight’s feature trot, with Magic Dash having the advantage of a front line mark and 20m start over his stablemate. “Both of them have to be good chances but it is a good little field and could be a really interesting race,” says Wallis. “Magic Dash has only had two starts back since needing surgery for colic last year but won really well last start and has good manners. “And Confessional came to us from Paul Nairn because his connections thought he was better right-handed and he handled the track here really well winning last start. “Magic Dash might have more speed and Confessional’s strength might be his stamina but these small fields can be really hard to predict.” Also hard to predict has been Final Approach (R2, No 3) who resumes as one of the three stable reps in his race tonight, with the couple’s daughter Crystal Hackett doing the driving. “We have always really liked him but he lost his way manners-wise last season,” explains Wallis. “But he has had two workouts this time in and done everything right. “I’d say if he trots all the way and produces his best on Friday he will be hard to beat.” Tonight’s meeting also sees the first juvenile pacing fillies race of the northern season and with early favourite As One Wishes scratched with a minor issue the race looks wide open, with manners the likely key. Another favourite scratched tonight is Sammy Lincoln, who comes out of Race 3 leaving impressive recent workouts winner Ms Collins only needing to do things right to be the one to beat after a promising debut last year as a two-year-old. View the full article

By Dave Di Somma, Harness News Desk Craig Thornley is literally hoping to go one better at Rangiora’s annual Waitangi Day meeting today. And that’s because three of the horses he’ll drive (Ma Belle Amie Franco, Waikaka and Moa Mojito) all finished second for him in their most recent starts. One of them in particular Ma Belle Amie Franco is heavily backed to get her maiden win. Trained by Steven McRae, Ma Belle Amie Franco is at $2 following her last start second at Wyndham on January 6. “She is getting better every time she’s away from the place and looks a good each way chance,” says Thornley. The Always B Miki four-year-old has drawn the ace over 1950 metres in Race 5, the HSW Accounts – The Tyre General Amberley Mobile Pace (5.14pm). “I’m unsure just how much gate speed she has .. I’d like to be lead or trail but three back the fence isn’t the worst place to be at Rangiora,” says Thornley. “She’s had a wee freshen up .. and anything she does she will improve on.” In Race 3, the Aurora Storm Handicap Pace (4.18pm) Thornley links up with another McRae-trained runner in Waikaka. A winner of two races he was second last start at Oamaru last Sunday and will be off 10 metres today. “He’s a good beginner so he should get handy and is an each way chance.” He opened at $5.50 with Lavra Rose (also 10m) a $3 favouirte. After driving those two stablemates Thornley will drive three for Ashburton trainer Ben Waldron. Moa Mojito will line up in Race 6, the G K Fyffe Painting “Making It Happen” Trot after finishing second to Go Home Denise at Methven on January 25. “I thought I had that too – just got caught in the last stride,” Thornley says. With a safe beginning she’s rated a decent each way chance, paying $7 and $2.40. Waldron’s second runner is Penny Weight in Race 8, the Valley Inn Tavern Mobile Pace (6.40pm). The five race winner will line up one the second line and Thornley says that makes his tactics pretty straight forward. “I’ll be following the number one (Kushite Warrior). Wherever she goes I’ll be going too,” says Thornley. Kushite Warrior is a $3.60 favourite for trainer Malcolm Shinn. In her latest runs Penny Weight finished third and fourth at Blenheim last month. Thornley’s final drive is the out of form Franco Chaplin in Race 10, the Dawe Contracting Ltd – Shore Accounting Solutions Mobile Pace (7.42pm). “It’s a confidence issue with him,” says Thornley, “he has some ability and if he’s running home well I’ll be happy.” The day’s pacing feature is the Rangiora Equine Services Amberley Cup (6.09pm) Audacity is the favourite after a fast finishing third last start. He’s drawn one in a small field that also has quality performers in Bazooka, Vessem and Smoke On The Water, who’s vying for his fourth win in a row though he will have to overcome a 40 metre handicap. View the full article

These types of surveys are a waste of time and money.  Most of time their questions are poorly worded and the results are skewed by responder bias.  Pointless exercise. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out what's wrong.  NZTR have now opened themselves up to small groups of stakeholders politicising the results and playing games. It is already with the likes of @curious and Wightman.  

Promising 3-year-olds Confessional and Renegade square off against seven other rivals in the Feb. 7 Sam F. Davis Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs.View the full article

I note still 2 places for the trot, only 6 at the moment, wanting 8,, looking at the slot holders it's really now just an in-house event, first year the pacers saw  Senz, Hydroflow got involved, clearly the interest has waned not helped by the Ellerslie one now where slot holders would get more exposure, maybe slots ain't the great savior some may have thought, maybe a passing phase.

Chief, I was not close to being found guilty. The reason I will give will also convince you, i believe. The RIU, JCA, and I had, from memory, at least 3 phone conference calls regarding the charge.The chairman was very clear in the conversations that there was no charge to answer and no chance of succeeding, and that the charges should be dismissed. But egos were being bruised, and Purcell and his team said the charge was to proceed.We all know the result and whilst i had paid 5k to my lawyer as quoted, that didn't end his costs, as after being awarded 15k, he said there was more work than he had estimated, so he also took the 15k.  It was worth the money, as while watching Purcell trying to remember the names of the 90 horses he had raced, and breaking into a sweat after getting to around 20, verified his incompetence, which many people believed. I was also going to add where Ross Neal is now after the charade/scandal he was involved with, and how did the other Stipe hold on to his job, after covering up for him?

Unbeaten Napoleon Solo (Liam's Map), unraced since a powerhouse, front-running victory in the GI Champagne S. at the Big A Oct. 4, is gearing up for his sophomore debut. The Gold Square colorbearer has posted four workouts for Chad Summers at Palm Meadows this winter, including a four-furlong bullet in :48 (1/19) Thursday. “He's doing well,” owner Al Gold said. “The plan is either the (GII Coolmore) Fountain of Youth (at Gulfstream) or the (GIII) Gotham (at Aqueduct) on Feb. 28 or the (GIII) Tampa Bay Derby Mar. 7.” The talented Cyberknife (Gun Runner) punched his ticket to the 2022 GI Kentucky Derby for Gold and trainer Brad Cox with a win in the GI Arkansas Derby. He also carried Gold's black-and-gold silks to a dramatic victory in the GI TVG.com Haskell S., a near-miss in the GI Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile at Keeneland and a runner-up finish in the GI Runhappy Travers S. The Spendthrift Farm stallion's first-crop 2-year-olds race in 2026. “Surprisingly, that was four years ago already,” Gold said. “Time goes by fast. It's great to be back having quality horses. We had a nice Gun Runner 3-year-old filly last year Dry Powder, who just missed by a neck in a Grade I (Cotillion S.). We had a lot of fun with her. It's great to have a colt. This is the exciting time, it's why you get in the game trying to win the Derby. So, we'll see how it plays out.” Gold and Summers decided to bypass the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile at Del Mar with Napoleon Solo following his 6 1/2-length victory going a one-turn mile in the 'Win and You're In' Champagne, which produced a gaudy 95 Beyer Speed Figure. The $40,000 Keeneland September steal previously broke his maiden in similar fashion at first asking in an auction-restricted maiden special weight at Saratoga Aug. 8. One of seven Grade I winners for Liam's Map, the John D. Gunther and Eurowest Bloodstock-bred Napoleon Solo was produced by Atomic Blonde (Scat Daddy), a stakes-winning homebred for the Gunthers. He is bred on the same Liam's Map x Scat Daddy cross as GI Blue Grass S. winner Burnham Square and also the dam of GISW and 'Rising Star' Brant (Gun Runner). Napoleon Solo is named for a fictional character from the TV spy series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. “We've had four or five horses that made the last races of their career as 2-year-olds,” Gold said. “They got hurt, so I'm very skeptical about going forward with a horse after they race that fast as a 2-year-old. I lost (2006 GII Saratoga Special Breeders' Cup S. winner) Chace City years ago, one with Brad Cox and another one with Jeremiah Englehart–they all ran really fast.” Gold continued, “I figured it was a good time to stop. I had a 2-year-old last year Two Out Hero (War Front), who won a stakes and lost by a length (third) in the GI Summer Stakes in Canada. I stopped on him also. I didn't want to go forward and risk being vulnerable and losing their 3-year-old years. We wanted to be able to have fresh horses as 3-year-olds.” Gold will have another 'fresh horse' for Saturday's Sam F. Davis S. at Tampa Bay Downs, good for 20-10-6-4-2 points on the Road to the Kentucky Derby. Game For It (Know Agenda), a debut winner at Aqueduct Dec. 10, is campaigned by Gold in partnership with breeder Wynnstay, Inc. and trainer Chad Summers. The post Unbeaten Champagne Winner Napoleon Solo Gearing Up at Palm Meadows appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article

3rd-TAM, $55K, Msw, 3yo, f, 1m 40yds, 1:36 p.m. ET. Three Chimneys bred ALWAYS A RUNNER (Gun Runner) as the first foal out of GSP Always Carina (Malibu Moon) who is the half-sister to Jeff Drown and Don Rachel's GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf hero Structor (Palace Malice). The farm bought Always Carina's dam, Miss Always Ready (More Than Ready), for $400,000 at the 2014 Keeneland April 2-Year-Old Sale. Her full-sister is Bobby Flay's GII Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf victress More Than Real. During the 2024 Keeneland September Sale, Valor Farm's tall Texan Douglas Scharbauer went to $1.05-million to acquire Always a Runner, then Three Chimneys stayed in for a piece before she was sent to trainer Chad Brown. As for Always Carina, she has visited Gun Runner consecutively which so far has yielded a March filly in 2024–who RNA'd for $850,000 at Keeneland September–and a April colt last year. TJCIS PPS The post Friday Insights: Always A Runner Done With Target Practice, Now Sights Tampa Maiden appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article

This wasn't the plan. Jon Green, the general manager of D.J. Stable, and trainer Mark Casse were ready to give 3-year-old filly champion Nitrogen (Medaglia d'Oro) a nice break after her second-place finish in the GI Longines Breeders' Cup Distaff. But just 67 days after her last race, she will go in Saturday's GIII Bayakoa Stakes at Oaklawn, where she is the 4-5 morning-line favorite. Why? Because Nitrogen was telling Casse that she had had enough of taking it easy. “The game plan, initially, was that when she was done with her championship campaign in 2025, we were going to give her two to three months off,” Green said. “Not only did she hit the board in every single one of the nine races she ran in last year, but she shipped around a lot to Florida, Kentucky, New York, back to Kentucky, and then all the way out to Del Mar for the Breeders' Cup. “Our full intention was to give her time off, let her relax and regroup for her 4-year-old campaign,” he said. “Like everything else in life, man plans and God laughs, and in this case Nitrogen had the last laugh. She is such a professional and loves training and loves what she's doing. We basically gave her three, three-and-a-half weeks off. Then Hall of Fame trainer Mark Casse called me and he said, 'I know the game plan was to give her time off. She doesn't want it. She wants to train and is sound and is doing well.' He said that his concern was that if he didn't train her, mentally, she might get a little sour on us and that's not what you want to do, especially with a filly. “So we put her back in light training because she didn't lose a lot of fitness and she picked it up very quickly,” said Green. “Our original intention was to focus on the Mar. 7 [GII] Azeri [Stakes] as a stepping stone to the [Apr. 11] [GI] Apple Blossom [Handicap], but she's ready to run. Is she 100 percent tuned up all the way for the Bayakoa? No. But she's probably 80 percent there and we feel like rather than give her another five weeks off, we would run her in this race.” Though he said his filly will be only 80 percent for the race, Green has no problem predicting that this will be the start of a big year for Nitrogen. “I'm not concerned about whether she'll take a step forward because I genuinely think she ranks atop that division right now,” he said. “Now, she has to fulfill her destiny.” Green added that the plan is to run in the Azeri, as well. After the Apple Blossom, he's not sure what path his Eclipse Award winner will be taking. Jon and Len Green after Nitorgen's Alabama win | Sarah Andrew “We're trying to take it the way Bill Parcells used to look at the NFL schedule back when it was 16 games,” Green said. “He would say there are four quarters to the season and I'm going to look at it one quarter at a time. That's really the way we are managing Nitrogen. We'll look at it every three or four months and try to work backwards from a signature race. For this quarter, it's the Apple Blossom.” D.J. Stable has never been afraid to sell a mare when she has reached peak value. Green said that the idea was discussed, but ultimately Nitrogen was just one they couldn't send to auction. “We did look at it from a business standpoint so far as whether we should cash in on her,” Green said. “We also had to take in the fact that my father [Len] is almost 90-years-old. Not that this is his last hurrah. But when you have a homebred like this and you want to keep the family, it's difficult to entertain offers. “We did, however, sell Tiffany Case, her mother, in foal to Not This Time,” he said. “She topped the January Sale for $3.2 million, so I feel like we cashed in on the family and we still have Nitrogen and Nitrogen's half-sister, a Gun Runner 2-year-old named Sniper that we're going to keep and race as well. We're fundamentally treating this as a business. We sold off some of the assets that we had because of Nitrogen's great year and her Eclipse win. But for right now, we are really enjoying campaigning the big mare.” It will be a busy Saturday at Oaklawn for the Casse-D.J. team, which will also send out 2025 GI Arkansas Derby winner Sandman (Tapit). He'll go in a $126,000 allowance race run at a mile-and-a-sixteenth. Unlike Nitrogen, he did not have the strongest of finishes to his season. After a fifth-place effort in the GII Jim Dandy at Saratoga in late July, the colt turned in a ninth-place showing when trying the grass for the first time in the GIII DK Horse Nashville Derby Invitational Stakes at Kentucky Downs in late August. “We ran him in the Jim Dandy and he ran a very tepid fifth place,” Green said. “In the Jim Dandy, we tried to put the blinkers on him to induce him to be a little closer to the lead and that didn't necessarily come to fruition. We tried him on the turf because the family had succeeded on the grass before and we thought maybe his going almost a mile-and-a-half would be a good distance for him, and he never really picked up his feet. At that time, he was telling us, 'I need a break.' He had been campaigning at a top level, really, from the moment we bought him. He never got a chance to get a mental break. We opted to pull the plug on him after the Kentucky Downs race and then did a minor surgery on an ankle.” Green said that he is also hearing good reports from Casse regarding Sandman's comeback. “Just like with Nitrogen, he's been moving forward by leaps and bounds,” he said. “We did not anticipate running him in February. We thought it might be a little later, maybe once at Oaklawn, once at Churchill, and then have a tough campaign for him going forward. The special ones, the ones with talent, they leap over your expectations. That's why we have Sandman in this race. He's ready to go.” The post Back Sooner Than Expected, Champion Nitrogen Will Kick Off Year In Saturday’s Bayakoa At Oaklawn appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions. View the full article