Highland Falls

The gates are scheduled to open at 9:30 a.m. on Friday. Post time for the first race is 11:35 and the first Breeders' Cup race goes off at 2:45. But long before those bright-eyed Breeders' Cup attendees begin filling the grandstands of Del Mar, the backside will have been awake for hours. For those back in the barns as Breeders' Cup morning dawns, in many ways it's just like any other day. It is the same routine of raking barn aisles, topping off water buckets, checking temps, preparing feed, wrapping...

Nobody should have been to surprised when Tarifa (Bernardini) won Saturday's GII Mother Goose S. at the Belmont at the Big A meet, turning the tables on the favored Gun Song (Gun Runner). The same goes for Saturday's GII Fayette S. at Keeneland, won by the Cox-trained Hit Show (Candy Ride {Arg}). Starting one month ago, on Sept. 27, he's been on a tear, winning 12 of the 17 (70 % percent) stakes races he has entered in. Overall, Cox is 20-for-63 (32%) for the month of October. He ran...

Trainer Chad Brown sent out his two Keeneland-based pre-entrants in the GI Breeders' Cup Mile--'TDN Rising Star' Carl Spackler (Ire) (Lope de Vega {Ire}) and Chili Flag (Fr) (Cityscape {GB})--together for a half-mile breeze over the grass in :50.40 (1/3) Saturday morning. According to Keeneland clockers, their final quarter mile went in :22.80. "I thought it was a great work, very straightforward," said jockey Tyler Gaffalione, who rode Carl Spackler to a win in Keeneland's GI Coolmore Turf Mile Stakes Oct. 5. "He's really feeling good out there. He's a...

There are people that work with horses and there are people that love horses. In the case of Katie Tolbert, there is no better example of a person that works with horses because of how much she loves them. You see the devotion on a quiet morning on the backside of Churchill Downs as she sits in the saddle, stroking the neck of the horse she is astride or is ponying alongside her. You hear it in the echo of a nicker from an excited trainee, eager for her company,...

Fresh off his gutsy win in the inaugural GI California Crown Stakes Saturday, Subsanador (Arg) (Fortify) jumped into the fourth slot of the NTRA Top Thoroughbred Poll. Last year's champion juvenile colt Fierceness (City of Light) sits at the top just 7 points ahead of top filly Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna). Top sprinter Cogburn (Not This Time) sits third while Highland Falls (Curlin) and National Treasure (Quality Road) share fifth to round out the top five. Idiomatic (Curlin), Next (Not This Time) and Seize the Grey (Arrogate) fill out the...

For many lifelong racetrackers, it's a natural ascent to start out as a hot walker, move up to becoming a groom and perhaps eventually, work your way towards exercise riding. That wasn't the case for Edgar Revolorio, groom of GI Breeders' Cup Classic hopeful Highland Falls (Curlin). Revolorio grew up around horses in his native Guatemala and when he moved to Texas to work with Quarter Horses, he started out there as an exercise rider. As he gained experience on the racetrack and learned more about the art of grooming,...

'TDN Rising Star' and GI Travers Stakes winner Fierceness (City of Light), owned by Repole Stables, has stayed in the top spot in the Longines Breeders' Cup Classic Rankings for the fourth consecutive week, in front of fellow 3-year-olds City of Troy (Justify) and Forever Young (Jpn) (Real Steel {Jpn}) after the eighth week of voting. Fierceness, trained by Todd Pletcher, rose to the top ranking following his dramatic Travers Stakes win at Saratoga Race Course Aug. 24. Last year's GI FanDuel Breeders' Cup Juvenile winner and champion 2-year-old male...

Saturday's GII Ainsworth Turf Sprint Stakes winner Cogburn (Not This Time) jumped from 13th to fifth in this week's NTRA Top Thoroughbred poll. The top four remain unchanged with Fierceness (City of Light) leading the way ahead of Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna), Adare Manor (Uncle Mo) and National Treasure (Quality Road). Highland Falls (Curlin) held steady in sixth while Dornoch (Good Magic) dropped to seventh. New to the Top 10 this week is another son of Not This Time in Next who last won the Birdstone Stakes at Saratoga Aug....

Godolphin's Highland Falls (Curlin) outdueled favored Arthur's Ride (Tapit) and strode home an easy winner of the GI Jockey Club Gold Cup Sunday at Saratoga. The 4-year-old earned his first top-level victory, as well as an automatic berth in the GI Breeders' Cup Classic, and gave jockey Flavien Prat his record-setting 13 graded win of the meeting. Arthur's Ride, coming off a win in the GI Whitney Stakes, rushed up and over from his outside post and had a clear advantage heading into the first turn through an opening quarter...

You know how the quote reads directly from the handicapper's Bible, "Behold the pale horse with controlling speed." Heeding that warning arrives once again on Sunday. Halfway through the three-day holiday weekend of Thoroughbred racing, Saratoga and Del Mar card graded races. The Spa's GI Jockey Club Gold Cup Stakes, the penultimate 'Win and You're In' pass to the Breeders' Cup Classic, sets the tone with a myriad of intriguing storylines woven into this fleece as a half dozen entries will try to catch that aforementioned 'pale horse' Arthur's Ride...

He may not have had a black-type win to his name coming into Saturday's GIII Blame S. at Churchill Downs, but some strong efforts and a 104 Beyer figure in his last out, a runner-up performance in the Apr. 20 GII Oaklawn H., were enough to convince the betting public HIGHLAND FALLS (c, 4, Curlin--Round Pond, by Awesome Again) belonged. They were right. The 4-5 choice got rolling late to catch last-out Keeneland allowance winner Cagliostro (Upstart) just before the wire, while former $975,000 Keeneland yearling and GI Pennsylvania Derby...

Godolphin's progressive homebred Highland Falls (Curlin) has been made the 5-2 favorite in a field of 11 for Saturday's GIII Blame S. at Churchill Downs, one of four graded stakes that serve as an appetizer to corresponding races on Stephen Foster Saturday in a month's time beneath the Twin Spires. The chestnut son of Round Pond (Awesome Again), upset winner of the 2006 GI Breeders' Cup Distaff at the Louisville oval, makes his third consecutive appearance in graded company, having run on to be a good fourth to Newgate (Into...