Bob Baffert

The long wait is just about over. Q B One (Uncle Mo), the first foal out of four-time Eclipse Award winner Beholder (Henny Hughes), will make his debut in Sunday's fourth race at Santa Anita, six days shy of turning four years old. Like Beholder, he was bred by and is owned by Spendthrift Farm and is trained by Richard Mandella. Kyle Frey has been named to ride. For now, Mandella's expectations for Q B One are rather modest. "I wish we'd see a little more from him to get...

Medina Spirit's necropsy is "currently underway" and a report on last week's sudden death of the GI Kentucky Derby winner is expected to be publicly released by mid-February, California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) equine medical director Dr. Jeff Blea said Wednesday. "Completion of sudden death case file reports takes weeks and months to complete due to the in-depth level of analysis involved, and we fully expect a final report in this case in approximately two months," Blea told commissioners at the Dec. 15 CHRB meeting. "Tissue samples and specimens will...

A federal judge has ordered that the New York Racing Association (NYRA) must pay trainer Bob Baffert $109,124 in legal expenses. Those fees and costs were incurred in the early stages of the trainer's civil rights lawsuit against NYRA, and the court has determined that legal precedents qualified him as the "prevailing party" five months ago when he obtained a preliminary injunction to overcome NYRA's banishment of him from Saratoga, Belmont and Aqueduct. That figure represents only a partial award. The Hall-of-Fame trainer had been seeking $162,086. NYRA had argued...

Sent off the 1-2 jolly to opening his account at first asking, Doppelganger (Into Mischief) never felt a crack of jockey Flavien Prat's whip and cruised home a 3 1/2-length winner to become yet another 'TDN Rising Star' for his all-conquering sire. Assigned gate one for the unveiling, the blinkered bay played pinball on three occasions with Asphalt Andy (Tapiture) to the outside, costing him any chance to make the lead, but he settled kindly and traveled comfortably while behind horses into the turn. Going well approaching the long stretch...

According to the attorneys representing Mick Ruis, a Los Angeles County Superior Court has ruled that the owner can continue his attempts to have the results of the 2018 GI Santa Anita Derby overturned. In January, the California Horse Racing Board (CHRB) voted to abide by the stewards' decision to let the result stand, with Justify (Scat Daddy) declared the official winner. The decision by Judge Mitchell L. Beckloff was in response to the CHRB's attempts to have the case halted based on a legal term known as a demurrer,...

Bob Baffert filed a legal response Friday to the New York Racing Association (NYRA)'s recent attempt to dismiss his amended civil complaint, in which the Hall-of-Fame trainer is fighting an allegedly "sham" hearing process initiated by NYRA to determine if he will be excluded from New York's premier tracks. The Dec. 10 filing in United States District Court (Eastern District of New York) rebutted and reargued a number of legal points that have already been volleyed back and forth by both sides since Baffert filed the initial version of his...

Ever get the feeling that somebody up there doesn't like us very much? Of all of the horses, in all of the world... But really it doesn't make any difference, however you interpret the tragedy of Medina Spirit (Protonico). The net result, for our community, is the same--whether you think the whole melodrama unfolded, entirely and lucklessly, at random; or was somehow determined by our own culpable behaviors. Whoever is writing these scripts, we have been cast in the same role. We are being tested. And if we don't get...

'TDN Rising Star' Messier (Empire Maker) will look to take his talent around two turns as a prohibitive favorite in Saturday's GII Los Alamitos Futurity. A $470,000 FTKSEL buy by the powerful ownership conglomerate nicknamed The Avengers, the bay settled for second at 1-2 in his local unveiling July 27. He resurfaced at Santa Anita Oct. 22 after a minor foot issue, and blew away his competition by 6 1/2 lengths. The son of MSW router Checkered Past (Smart Strike) made similarly short work of Del Mar's GIII Bob Hope...

Sponsored by Alex Nichols Agency PRICEY NYQUIST DEBUTS AT LOS AL 5th-LRC, $52K, Msw, 2yo, f, 6f, 4:58 p.m. Mick Ruis went to $510,000 at KEESEP to acquire WAITING ON WENDY (Nyquist) and she debuts here for his daughter Shelbe Ruis. The bay is a half to GSW & GISP Divine Miss Grey (Divine Park) and GSP Divine Dawn (Divine Park). Their dam is a hald to MGSW & MGISP Noble Court (Doneraile Court). This is also the family of GISW Complexity (Maclean's Music) and GSW & GISP Valadorna (Curlin)....

Researchers at the University of Minnesota will assist in investigating the high-profile death of GI Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit (Protonico), who collapsed on Monday due to a suspected cardiac event. While an official necropsy will be conducted at the University of California, Davis, samples of hair, blood, and heart tissue are en route to the university's College of Veterinary Medicine's (CVM) Equine Genetics and Genomics Laboratory, where scientists are already studying cardiac arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death in racehorses. Researchers are expected to release their findings to the California...

It was a busy news week, headlined by the unfortunate sudden death of GI Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit (Protonico) and the 30-day suspension handed down to leading rider Irad Ortiz, Jr. Wednesday morning, Joe Bianca, Bill Finley and Jon Green of the TDN Writers' Room presented by Keeneland discussed and reacted to all of it, rekindled the debate over whether trainer Bob Baffert is good for the sport, and welcomed the director of the upcoming film "Jockey" as the Green Group Guest of the Week. "A couple of weeks...