Horse Racing

6th-Keeneland, $116,200, Alw (NW2X)/Opt. Clm ($125,000), 10-23, 3yo, f, 1 1/8m, 1:52.16, ft, 1 length. NEON ICON (f, 3, Arrogate--Mademoiselle Coco, by Medaglia d'Oro) earned 'TDN Rising Star' honors on debut at Keeneland Apr. 17 with a 4 1/2-length score. The gray cleared the allowance ranks next time over a wet track at Churchill Downs May 23. Well-beaten in the GIII Indiana Oaks July 6, Neon Icon finished seventh in the GI Alabama Stakes at the Spa Aug. 17 and fifth in the Seneca Overnight Stakes under the Twin Spires...

A total of 16 individual horses from the United States and Canada have been handed entries for the 2024 Longines Hong Kong International Races at Sha Tin Racecourse Sunday, Dec. 8. The four Group 1 races--the Longines Hong Kong Cup (2000mT, Longines Hong Kong Mile, Longines Hong Sprint (1200mT) and Longines Hong Kong Vase (2400mT)--offer record prize money of HK$126 million ($16.21 million). No fewer than nine American-based short-track specialists have been entered for HK$26-million ($3.35-million) Sprint, including the record-setting Cogburn (Not This Time), who is expected to go favored...

Bolstered by a record 80 entries from the connections of horses based overseas--smashing the previous mark of 60 set just last year--some 212 horses have been pre-entered for the 2024 Breeders' Cup World Championships to be held Friday and Saturday, Nov. 1 and 2. For the third time, the festival will take place at the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club, which hosted the event for the first time in 2017 and again in 2021. "The record number of outstanding international contenders pre-entered this year speaks to the truly global nature of...

Officials at Breeders' Cup Limited have released the official order of races, post times and wagering menu for the 2024 Breeders' Cup World Championships at Del Mar Friday and Saturday, Nov. 1 and 2, including slight changes from the race order announced earlier this month. The $7-million GI Longines Breeders' Cup Classic will be broadcast live on NBC and streamed on Peacock remains the centerpiece of championship Saturday, with post time set for 2:41 p.m. PT to take advantage of a 2 1/2-hour window on NBC. There are four Breeders'...

Golden State Racing (GSR) has reached an agreement with The Stronach Group's (TSG) Xpressbet, allowing punters to be able to wager on Pleasanton through that particular ADW platform when racing resumes this Friday. GSR launched its inaugural 26-day Thoroughbred meet at Pleasanton Saturday, Oct. 19. But punters hoping to wager on its product through Xpressbet and the New York Racing Association's NYRA Bets were shut out--a scenario stemming from a disagreement over the fees that form a key part of a track's purses and revenues. Similarly, Elite Turf Club players...

Horse racing has a PR problem. Tina Bond has a possible solution. "It's to create a new narrative and to help elevate the sport," said Bond, president of the New York Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association (NYTHA), and the mastermind behind The Heart of Horse Racing, a new campaign--one undergoing something of a soft launch--to cultivate new followers to the game by sharing the stories of those already in it. In the campaign's own words, "our mission is to win over the hearts and minds of a new generation of fans while...

With so many roads now leading to Del Mar, traffic may feel pretty slow just now. But we should make a virtue of that, in that our preoccupation with the elite program tends to deny due attention to those achieving their success a tier or so below the very top. After all, such people have typically required no less skill, endeavor and patience, often denied the very highest rewards only through lacking similar parity in resources. Take the breeder of GIII Ontario Derby winner Dresden Row (Lord Nelson), whose emergence...

The "Heroes Day" program at Caymanas Park on the island of Jamaica had to be called off after the second race Oct. 21 when hooligan racegoers reacted violently to a controversial stewards' disqualification of an odds-on winner by upending garbage bins, hurling debris at horses and jockeys on the track and in the winner's circle, and blocking the tunnel between the paddock and the track. "After an initial announcement that the third event was abandoned, the day's meet was officially called off by the stewards, citing safety concerns," the Jamaican...

Harris Auerbach, a long-time Thoroughbred industry stakeholder who campaigned California's all-time leading sire Unusual Heat, is rolling out a new breeding and sales operation called HorsePAUER Enterprises, the owner of PAUER Consulting said in a release Tuesday. HorsePAUER will operate as a subsidiary of Auerbach's main company and offerings include stakeholder development, breeding stock portfolio management and bloodstock/matings consultations. Auerbach launched PAUER Consulting earlier this year which brought together a wide-array of services under the umbrella of strategy and special projects expertise. PAUER's clients include major universities, charitable organizations and...

Seven of the 11 directors of the Pennsylvania Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association (PTHA) filed a legal response Monday that denied sweeping allegations of corruption and cronyism that were made last month by the PTHA's current president and another board member. Facing a petition in the Court of Common Pleas of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, that seeks to use a state business corporations law to remove those seven directors from the PTHA board, the respondents stated in their Oct. 21 filing that the petition should be denied "because it is both legally and...

A well-bred daughter of Dubawi (Ire), Opulent Restraint donned cap and gown at second asking upstate Sept. 1. The gray was well-backed by the public here at 75 cents on the dollar. Settling at the rear of the field into the first turn with Rare Art (Munnings), the filly was on hold up the backstretch, but started to get underway before the top of the lane. Shifting into high gear in the three path, the juvenile took command with a furlong left and despite a challenge from her rival Rare...

With the Del Mar Breeders' Cup officially less than two weeks away, trainer Chad Brown is continuing to oversee his string's preparations at Belmont Park, while the accomplished MGISW Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna) puts in her final works for conditioner Ken McPeek upstate at Saratoga. Over the training surface in Elmont, Brown sent out two juveniles for half-mile works in 'TDN Rising Star' Chancer McPatrick (McKinzie) [:48.01] and Zulu Kingdom (Ire) (Ten Sovereigns {Ire}) [:48.63], who are targeting the GI FanDuel Breeders' Cup Juvenile and GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf,...