Connect

A field of 11, led by Gun Runner S. winner Chip Honcho (Connect), will line up in Saturday's GIII Lecomte S. at Fair Grounds, good for 20-10-6-4-2 points on the Road to the Kentucky Derby. The Gun Runner was Chip Honcho's first try around two turns and third career start for Hall of Famer Steve Asmussen. The Leland Ackerley Racing colorbearer is drawn widest of all in post 11. The re-opposing Ohio-bred Crown the Buckeye (Yaupon), favored at 4-1 on the Lecomte morning-line, set the pace and tired late to...

Continuing a fruitful campaign since returning from his elite-level World Cup triumph in Dubai, Hit Show (Candy Ride {Arg}) put his best foot forward once again to take home the GIII Fayette Stakes on closing day of the Keeneland Fall meet. The grey collected his second win here since returning from Meydan, but had been tasked with taking on some salty company in the contests he didn't claim, too--namely the likes of Breeders' Cup Classic contenders Sierra Leone (Gun Runner) and Mindframe (Constitution) in the GI Stephen Foster back in...

Some of the most highly anticipated races during the summer season are the 'baby' races during the boutique meetings at Saratoga and Del Mar and at Ellis Park, which attract its fair share of high-priced juveniles from a variety of top national outfits. Summer Breezes, sponsored by OBS Sales, highlights debuting and stakes-entered 2-year-olds at those meetings that have been sourced at the breeze-up sales earlier in the year, including links to their under-tack previews. Here are the horses entered for Sunday at Saratoga and Ellis Park. Sunday, July 6,...

1st-Saratoga, $90,000, (C), Msw, 6-8, 2yo, f, 5 1/2f, 1:05.25, ft, 4 lengths. ANGEL GIFT (f, 2, Connect--Georgie's Angel {GSW, $129,564}, by Bellamy Road), installed the 3-2 choice for this unveiling, settled off the fleet-footed favorite Gorrono Ranch (War of Will) and Nacho Problem (Waiting), who carved out an opening quarter mile in :22.44. With the top two still exchanging blows straightening for home, Angel Gift still had several lengths to make up but was picking up steam down the center of the track. Turning on the gas late, he...

With a sweeping move around the final of three turns in the 1 1/2-mile closing-day feature, Forever After All (Connect), currently in foal to Flightline, took over from a pair of embattled pacesetters and romped home by daylight in the GIII Bewitch Stakes at Keeneland. Facing a scratched-down field over a course listed as yielding, the 9-5 favorite, a last-out fifth in the GIII The Very One Stakes at Gulfstream Mar. 1, let two rivals to her inside show the way for much of the running before making a confident,...

In support of the Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame, the Continuing Stallion Auction kicks off Friday, Jan. 10 before concluding Jan. 15. The online auction offers seasons to 30 Thoroughbred and Standardbred horses, all CHRHF inductees or have Hall of Fame horses in their pedigrees. Among the stallions represented, Ami's Flatter, Bond Street, Connect, Medallist, Mystic Guide, Reload, Shirl's Speight and Tapiture. For the complete roster of stallions, click here.

If this seems a strangely specific category, that's because it is. There are two dozen sires standing in Kentucky at $10,000, a fee that attempts to preserve their dignity against a candid slide into the bargain basement. Though you're only a cent away from offering your stallion at four figures, you want him to look accessible without being low-rent. Only a couple are newcomers, all of which were dealt with separately in opening this series. Otherwise this is chiefly the bracket of youngish stallions whose rookie vogue is spent, anxious...

In a season highlighted by victories in the GI Kentucky Derby, GI Kentucky Oaks and GI Breeders' Cup Distaff, the training job Ken McPeek has done with the overachieving Rattle N Roll (Connect) is equally deserving of plaudits. Making his second start off a 363-day absence and having shipped to the West Coast and back when failing to draw into the GI Breeders' Cup Classic on Nov. 2, Rattle N Roll returned to something approaching his best under the Friday night lights at Churchill, rallying wide into the stretch before...

8th-Belmont The Big A, $90,000, Msw, 10-3, 2yo, f, 6fT, 1:09.68, fm, 2 lengths. CANDY QUEST (f, 2, Connect--Candy Crush, by Candy Ride {Arg}), a $225,000 Keeneland September yearling who was the priciest of her sire's 31 yearlings reported as sold in 2023 (43 ring), set her sights on heavily favored Tam I Am (Authentic) entering the final eighth of a mile and kicked past with relative ease to graduate in very professional fashion at first asking Thursday afternoon. Live on the board at 9-2 from a 5-1 morning line,...

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY - Fasig-Tipton concluded an impressive week of work in Saratoga with the second and final session of the company's New York-Bred Yearling Sale Monday at the Humphrey S. Finney Pavilion. The auction finished with a sale-record median and the third-highest average in its history. Trainer Chad Brown, bidding on behalf of Seth Klarman's Klaravich Stable made the sale's highest bid when going to $370,000 just five hips from the end of Monday's session. "It was another successful edition of the New York-bred sale," said Fasig-Tipton President Boyd...

Today we'll consider some of the sires standing between $10,001 and $19,999. For a long time, I called this the Lookin At Lucky zone. But don't worry, we won't be deploring his neglect yet again: he's staying in Chile, where they evidently appreciate him rather more. Plenty of horses in this bracket have recently relinquished their brief window of commercial opportunity, and are now hanging around to discover whether they might join the very small group whose first runners generate a fresh vogue. Even with the newcomers out of the...

Chad Brown had three chances to record a sixth victory in the last eight runnings of the GIII Pebbles S., and it was the 10-1 longest priced of the trio Implicated (Connect) who parlayed a perfect trip into a first black-type success Saturday at the Big A. Drawn the fence with Manny Franco at the controls for the first time, the $125,000 Fasig-Tipton October yearling purchase was away without incident and raced a touch keen into the first turn as 53-1 Precious Avary (Divining Rod) showed the way at a...