Robert Medina

5th-CD, $120K, Msw, 2yo, 5f, 2:45 p.m. ET. As TDN's Bill Finley reported earlier this week, Horse of the Year Flightline (by Tapit) has his first foal ready to hit the track at Churchill Downs on Friday. GREENWELL was a $500,000 buy for Greg Tramontin during the 2025 Keeneland September Sale. Sent to trainer Mark Casse, the Flightline colt is out of MGSW Cambodia (War Front), who is a half-sister to the dam of GSW Danse Macabre (Army Mule). Also set for a start is another Keeneland grad in Grand...

Six hopefuls pre-entered into their respective Breeders' Cup races turned in final works Saturday morning at Keeneland, and connections are reporting positive prognoses ahead of shipping dates. On the dirt track went Bentornato (Valiant Minister), breezing four furlongs in :49.40 (34/89). Jockey Irad Ortiz Jr. was in the irons. The 4-year-old is pre-entered into the GI Cygames Breeders' Cup Sprint and is looking to improve a placing from last year as the runner-up in the 2024 edition. "[I was] looking for a nice, easy workout," trainer Jose D'Angelo said. "We...

Newtown Anner Stud Farm's Praying (f, 3, Vekoma--Pray for Leslie, by Bernardini), a 21-1 upset winner of the GIII Prioress S. at Saratoga Aug. 30, backed up that breakout performance with a half-length victory over her elders in Saturday's 'Win and You're In' GII Thoroughbred Club of America S. at Keeneland. Favored Vahva (Gun Runner) was second. Zeitlos (Curlin) was third. "It's surreal," winning trainer Robbie Medina said. "There's nothing like winning a big stakes at Keeneland. It's great." Praying raced in an outside fifth beneath John Velazquez and made...

Starting Saturday's graded stakes action off in style, Praying (Vekoma), the longest shot on the board at 21-1, sprung the upset over 'TDN Rising Star' Delightful Claire (Thousand Words) in the GIII Prioress Stakes at Saratoga. Stakes-placed as a juvenile in the Myrtlewood at Keeneland as  a juvenile, this $410,000 OBS April grad came off a four-month layoff to grab another stakes placing in the Southern Hospitality Overnight Stakes at Oaklawn in March. The promise of that start went unfulfilled however when Praying broke through the gate in her most...

His father had long since ceased training, but they still always stood at the same point by the Santa Anita paddock. "There was a spot there, where the horses come out from the saddling enclosure and make a right," Evan Ferraro recalls. "From there you could look at them straight on, so you could see their conformation, their joints, and my dad would point stuff out to me." And there was one filly by In Excess (Ire) that just blew the veteran horseman away: a Harris Farms homebred, saddled by...