Saratoga

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY--After accepting his fourth H. Allen Jerkens training title late Monday afternoon, Chad Brown spoke to a common theme on the final day of a joyous season following the COVID-19 summer without fans at Saratoga Race Course "Happy to have everybody back at the meet. That was the big thing," Brown said. "The most rewarding part of the meet was having everybody back. Last year, win or lose, it just wasn't any fun. I can speak for me and a lot of people around me that it just...

Gunite (Gun Runner) capped off a remarkable summer for both his freshman sire and his trainer on closing day Monday at Saratoga, shaking off pace pressure and kicking away in the stretch to an 11-1 upset of the GI Hopeful S. His well-earned victory made it a clean sweep of the Spa's annual marquee 2-year-old races for Three Chimneys Farm's freshman sensation Gun Runner after Echo Zulu dominated the GI Spinaway S. Sunday, and was the icing on the cake for Steve Asmussen, who had his most successful Saratoga season...

7th-Saratoga, $100,000, Msw, 9-6, 2yo, 6f, 1:10.53, my, 2 lengths. DON'T WAIT UP (c, 2, Upstart--Lovely Marissa, by Proud Citizen) was sent off the even-money choice to build on a nose second to GI Hopeful S. starter Power Agenda (Nyquist) on debut Aug. 14. Scratched down into gate three, the bay colt, the subject of Steve Sherack's Second Chances column Sept. 3, veered sharply inward when the gates flew, causing Matt Doyle (Violence) and the well-backed Commandperformance (Union Rags) to take evasive action. From there Don't Wait Up was ridden...

Sent off as part of an entry at just over 3-1, DJ Stable's Adversity (Arrogate--Artemis Agrotera, by Roman Ruler) became the first winner for her late freshman sire (by Unbridled's Song) with a second-out success Monday at Saratoga. Run over a main track that was downgraded from good to sloppy and sealed by a quick-passing storm, the grey filly--a debut seventh sprinting over the turf course Aug. 12--stepped well from an outside gate and pressed the pace from the outside beneath the hot-riding Ricardo Santana, Jr. Asked to win her...

L and N Racing and Winchell Thoroughbreds' Echo Zulu (Gun Runner) became her freshman sire's first Grade I winner, third graded winner overall--and his second of the upstate meet--with a wire-to-wire victory in the GI Spinaway S. at Saratoga Sunday. "I can't measure how much I wanted to have Gun Runner's first Grade I winner," admitted Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen, who also conditioned the 2017 Horse of the Year. "Everything he did for the barn, he's obviously a tremendous sire and somebody had to be first, but I'm...

8th-Saratoga, $100,000, Msw, 9-5, 2yo, f, 7f, 1:23.53, gd, 10 lengths. JESTER CALLS NOJOY (f, 2, Maclean's Music--Morning Star, by Sky Mesa), second at 9-5 in her six-furlong unveiling Aug. 15, went quickly to the front, carving out initial splits of :22.99 and :46.58. In the clear leaving the quarter pole, the 3-5 choice bounded away through the lane, crossing the wire 10 lengths ahead of Malibu Kendall (Curlin) at the wire. It was a length farther back to Handbelle (Tapit). The winner's dam, Morning Star, is also responsible for...

Sponsored by Alex Nichols Agency 8th-SAR, $100K, Msw, 2yo, f, 1 1/16mT, 4:29 p.m. ET It's been a successful handful of weeks at Saratoga for celebrity chef Bobby Flay, at the racetrack with the likes of GIII Caress S. winner Caravel (Mizzen Mast) and across the street at Fasig-Tipton, where he sold an Uncle Mo colt from his Grade I winner Dame Dorothy (Bernardini) for $1.6 million. He'll try to end the meet on another high note when he sends out OLD SCHOOL (GB) (Frankel {GB}). Through bloodstock agent James...

George Hall and SportBLX's Max Player (Honor Code) proved his bounce-back GII Suburban S. score in July was no fluke as he again showed more speed and pulled away to an emphatic victory in the repositioned GI Jockey Club Gold Cup at Saratoga. A fringe player on last year's Triple Crown trail, the Steve Asmussen trainee has stamped himself as a legitimate GI Breeders' Cup Classic threat in two strong efforts at 10 furlongs, and earned an automatic berth into the year-end championship event Saturday as part of the "Win...

The meteoric ascent of George Krikorian's War Like Goddess (English Channel) continued in Saturday's GI Flower Bowl S., contested at Saratoga for the first time and lengthened to 11 furlongs. Coincidentally, the GI Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Turf will be contested over that exact trip the first weekend of November and with the victory, the 4-year-old has earned an all-expenses-paid trip to Del Mar, where she figures to take plenty of beating. Four of the bay filly's prior starts had come at a mile and three furlongs and farther,...

Annapolis (c, 2, War Front--My Miss Sophia, by Unbridled's Song) was backed with supreme confidence as the 6-5 favorite in a seemingly wide-open, two-turn grass maiden special weight at the Spa Saturday, and he ran to the money with an ultra-impressive 'TDN Rising Star' debut performance. The Ramona Bass homebred's worktab featured a trio of visually impressive drills over the Oklahoma training turf for Hall of Famer Todd Pletcher, including a four-furlong spin in :50 2/5 (24/74) around the dogs Aug. 8. He raced toward the back in eighth in...

Edited Press Release Kentucky Downs and the New York Racing Association, Inc. (NYRA) have reached a simulcast agreement that will allow NYRA, its affiliated racetracks and its online betting platform NYRA Bets to accept wagers on Kentucky Downs' six-date meet that begins Sunday. "We are grateful and appreciative of NYRA management for this amicable resolution and delighted that all NYRA outlets will be able to wager on Kentucky Downs," said Ted Nicholson, Kentucky Downs' Vice President for Racing. The agreement also means horseplayers betting on-site at any Kentucky track will...

Sponsored by Alex Nichols Agency HALF TO BOBBY'S KITTEN DEBUTS IN KY 2nd-KYD, $135K, Msw, 2yo, f, 6 1/2f, 1:53 p.m. Joe Sharp unveils MISTHAVEN (IRE) (Candy Ride {Arg}) in this first baby race of this boutique meet. SF Bloodstock purchased Celestial Woods (Forestry) for $350,000 with this filly in utero at the 2018 FTKNOV sale. She is also the dam of GI Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint winner and millionaire Bobby's Kitten (Kitten's Joy) and MGSW Camelot Kitten (Kitten's Joy). TJCIS PPs PLETCHER UNVEILS PRICEY CLASSIC EMPIRE FILLY AT THE...