Mark Casse

LEXINGTON, KY - The Keeneland September Yearling Sale continued ahead of its 2023 edition as Book 3 concluded Sunday night with a colt by Maxfield leading the way when selling for $575,000. Through the two Book 3 sessions, 526 yearlings sold through the ring for a gross of $83,880,000. The section's average was $159,468--up 4.7% from a year ago--and the median was $130,000, an increase of 13.04%. Ten horses sold for $500,000 or more, compared to 13 hitting that mark a year ago. During last year's Book 3 section, 562...

Mark Casse-trained horses ran 1-2-3-5 in the first of Saturday's Grade I events at Woodbine, the Natalma Stakes, led by Live Oak's And One More Time (Omaha Beach). The barn accounted for the exacta in the day's final elite-level affair when 13-1 Win for the Money (Mohaymen) slipped through at the fence following a ground-saving journey to upend pacesetting stablemate Filo Di Arianna (Brz) (Drosselmeyer) in the GI Rogers Woodbine Mile and punch his ticket to the GI Breeders' Cup Mile at Del Mar on Nov. 2. Content to linger...

Hall of Fame trainer Mark Casse won 15 races out of 53 starts during the tough as nails Saratoga meet this season, which amounted to a 28% clip. One of those runners who got her picture taken was La Cara (Street Sense--Cara Caterina, by Bernardini). Off that performance, she rolled into Louisville for the GIII Pocahontas Stakes and won, which earned her 10 points on the path to next May's running of the GI Kentucky Oaks. In the first two starts of her career under the Twin Spires earlier this...

Trainer Mark Casse had won the GI Natalma Stakes no fewer than seven times dating back to Woodford Racing's Sprung (Grand Slam) back in 2006, but he had not succeeded since 2016, when Victory to Victory (Exchange Rate) carried the silks of Charlotte Weber's Live Oak Stud. The Hall of Famer had every chance to add to that total and snap the drought in Saturday's renewal, as he saddled six of the 11 juvenile fillies that went postward, and when all was said and done, the stable accounted for the...

Leading the graded stakes action on Saturday, there is something gruff and boomy about the barbaric 'yalp' of the European invaders who are set to swarm Woodbine's gates on Turf Champions Day. One can understand this hoard's verve as the booty is worth pillaging since three out of the four Grade I races on the docket are connected to some highly-prized Breeders' Cup 'Win and You're In' tickets.   Euros Wind Trebuchets Out of this auspicious Canadian slate, first up is the GI Natalma Stakes which offers entry into the...

5th-Woodbine, C$73,722, Msw, 9-8, 2yo, 5fT, :57.43, gd, 1 1/4 lengths. TAPIT KISSIT WINIT (c, 2, Tapit--Let It Ride Mom {GSW-Can, GSP-USA, $380,501}, by Into Mischief), sent off the 8-5 second choice for his debut, broke awkwardly as favored Crucial Taunt (Karakontie {Jpn}) rushed to the front while Springer (Complexity) completely blew the start, checking out early. Settled into a track fourth as the pacesetter raced through a quarter in :22.17, the Live Oak homebred began to pick up the tempo as Miss Mitole (Mitole) bolted and threw out the...

6th-Saratoga, $90,000, (S), Msw, 8-25, 2yo, f, 5 1/2fT, 1:03.94, fm, 1 1/2 lengths. CHARLOTTE'S HEART (f, 2, Authentic--Achalaya, by Bellamy Road), the 3-1 half-sister to Casa Creed (Jimmy Creed), MGISW-USA, MGSP-KSA, $2,691,308, showed an affinity for the Saratoga turf may run in the family. Racing near the back of the field in her afternoon debut for trainer Mark Casse, the $725,000 yearling purchase had plenty of work to do turning for home but really hit her best stride late when switched out to the center of the track. Pacesetter...

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...

A synthetic track is necessary for the survival of New York breeding farms, such as Sequel. The New York Bred program and the breeder awards generated are incredibly beneficial and fundamental to the financial stability of the New York farms and breeders. However, New York breeders only earn awards for horses competing within New York. Unfortunately, horses that are predominantly competitive on turf are often shipped to Florida or Louisiana for turf racing as owners want to see their horses race. As such, several prominent New York trainers base their...

SARATOGA SPRINGS - When one of Bob Baffert's horses is doing well, the Hall of Fame trainer expects a big effort. That's why 'TDN Rising Star' Prince of Monaco (Speightstown) has made his second cross-country trip in the last two months. That's why he is right here, in Saratoga, getting ready to run in the $500,000 GI Allen Jerkens Memorial on Saturday. "It's a tough race, there are no easy spots," Baffert said by phone from his summer base at Del Mar in California. "Anytime you have a Grade I,...

At the start of this year's Saratoga meet, jockey Dylan Davis had a goal of beating the 19 wins he came home with last year. With two weeks still left to go before the NYRA circuit heads back downstate, Davis has already accomplished what he set out to do. He has scored 23 wins, including multiple stakes victories and his first Grade I in the U.S., and is currently ranked fourth in a highly competitive Saratoga jockey colony. The 29-year-old has finished in the money in 45% of his 119...

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N. Y. - Saturday is going to be a big day for horses being pointed to the $1.24-million GI Travers Stakes. Two key horses for the race--Dornoch (Good Magic) and Fierceness (City of Light)--had their final works switched from Friday to Saturday. They will join Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna), Sierra Leone (Gun Runner), Honor Marie (Honor Code) and Batten Down (Tapit), who are all scheduled to have their final Midsummer Derby moves on Saturday. Saratoga did have some heavy rain on Thursday, but the track appeared ok on...