Shifty

With five fillies in the 70th running of the Woodbine Oaks, chances were high that it would be a Mark Casse runner to beat them all. The hard part, or so it was thought, would be figuring out which one would step up to win it. No Time (Not This Time) did just that in fine style to take home the hardware carrying the colors of Gary Barber. With only two prior lifetime wins--her maiden score on the grass last September and two back June 1 over the synthetic track...

Fresh off their 4,000th and 2,600th victories, respectively, trainer Mark Casse and D. J. Stable will try to add to those lofty achievements in Sunday's C$500,000 Woodbine Oaks. Casse, who is looking to tie trainer Jim Day as a five-time winner of the nine-furlong contest, has no fewer than five chances, two of which are campaigned by the Green family. Winterberry (Frosted) has won half of her six trips to the post, including last year's seven-furlong Glorious Song Stakes as a short-priced favorite and a latest pillar-to-post success in the...

It's been 17 years now that we've been treated to 2-year-olds by Medaglia d'Oro. From his first GII Golden Rod Stakes winner in his first crop--Rachel Alexandra, a filly who went on to beat the boys more than once and was eventually named Horse of the Year--to his latest this past weekend in perfect four-for-four Good Cheer, the Darley mainstay and ageless wonder continues to amaze and delight. "It's so gratifying for him in the autumn of his career to be hitting these heights," said Darley's Darren Fox. "He's been...

Continuing an important weekend as next month's Breeders' Cup World Championships rapidly approach, Keeneland's GI Juddmonte Spinster Stakes headlines Sunday's graded stakes action spanning from coast to coast. A 'Win and You're In' for the GI Longines Breeders' Cup Distaff, the Spinster has six contenders signed on, including last season's champion older mare Idiomatic (Curlin), who draws the rail under regular pilot Florent Geroux. The winner of a trio of Grade I stakes in 2023--capped off by the Breeders' Cup Distaff at Santa Anita--the Juddmonte homebred has proven consistent at...

The betting public pounded D J Stable's previously undefeated Bullet (War Front) into 3-5 favoritism for Friday's Catch a Glimpse Stakes at Woodbine, but it was the same outfit's uncoupled SHIFTY (f, 2, Medaglia d'Oro--Elusive Luci, by Elusive Quality) who spoiled the party at odds of 11-1. Given her chance in stakes company off a slow-starting fifth in a six-furlong maiden July 4, the $350,000 Fasig-Tipton October yearling emerged from a line of about five or six horses to take up the running down the backstretch and led them along...