New Orleans

Due to heavy rainfall forecasted for the New Orleans area Sunday, Fair Grounds has canceled their Sunday race card. The cancellation, which was announced during the live draw for Saturday's GII Louisiana Derby, will impact racing during the track's closing weekend next Saturday and Sunday with both days carding extra races to make up for the loss. Racing will resume at Fair Grounds Wednesday, March 20.

Louisiana's Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots will host 73 black-type races worth a combined $9.7 million during the upcoming 76-day 2023-24 Thoroughbred meet, officials at the New Orleans oval announced Wednesday. The amount is up $1.2 million from last year, but does include $1 million in base purses offered Dec. 2 as Fair Grounds hosts the 25th annual Claiming Crown. That event returns to Fair Grounds for the first time since 2011 with purses ranging from $75,000 to $200,000. Another $25,000 in each race will be available in purse...

The colt had been getting a little fractious in the gate and now he half sat down: too low for Jareth Loveberry to climb out, but not low enough to scramble underneath. "Get me out!" the jockey hollered. He was just trying to lift himself clear when his mount came back up and pinned a calf against the steel. The pain was excruciating. It was only five seconds or so before they got the gate open but that was enough, as they stretched him out, for the agony to be...

Edited Press Release Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry will be the keynote speaker at the National HBPA's annual conference Mar. 6-10 at the Hotel Monteleone in New Orleans' historic French Quarter, the horsemen's organization announced. The conference, being hosted by the Louisiana HPBA, takes place in conjunction with the Association of Racing Commissioners International (ARCI) Annual Meeting and Racing Integrity Conference. Landry's keynote address is to be delivered Mar. 7. He has been at the forefront of states challenging the constitutionality of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act (HISA) and...

The annual Dec. 26 start of the Santa Anita season has a natural, anticipatory, turn-the-page vibe to it. But this mark-your-calendar Opening Day mainstay hasn't always been a post-holiday tradition. Although Santa Anita has kicked off its winter/spring meet on the day after Christmas every year since 1977, the track originally opened in 1934 on Christmas Day itself, and did so for the first four years of its existence. "Filmdom entirely forgot its world of make-believe to migrate to the Santa Anita track yesterday for the renewal of horse racing...

Ron Faucheux, James Graham and Evelyn Benoit's Brittlyn Stable locked up titles for leading trainer, jockey and owner, respectively, at the Fair Grounds, where the 2021-2022 meeting concluded Sunday, Mar. 27. A native of Louisiana, Faucheux won his second consecutive training championship at the New Orleans oval, sending out 43 winners, a total 10 greater than Eclipse Award winner Brad Cox. Faucheux won three stakes at the meet. James Graham won 72 races during the meeting to reign as champion jockey for the third straight season and fourth overall. Among...

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY--There's more than a casual connection between New Orleans, Masqueparade (Upstart) and Saratoga Race Course, where the colt will run Saturday in the $1.25-million GI Runhappy Travers. Trained by New Orleans native Al Stall for a group of New Orleans businessmen and pals headed by Wilbur "Bill" Babin called FTGGG Racing and whose name references the masks worn during the city's signature Mardi Gras festivities, Masqueparade was purchased with Saratoga in mind. Babin made his first visit to Saratoga in 2003; has come for the entire meet since...

Racing at the Fair Grounds in New Orleans drew to a close Mar. 28, a meet which saw purses hiked no fewer than three times and featured a typically strong stakes and overnight program supported by a wide swath of horsepeople. Ron Faucheux won his first training title at the Fair Grounds with 40 victories, three better than four-time defending champion trainer Brad Cox, whose successes at the meeting included the GII Risen Star S. with 'TDN Rising Star' Mandaloun (Into Mischief) and the GII Fair Grounds Oaks with 'Rising...

Due to severe weather conditions in the New Orleans area prior to the start of Thursday's races, Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots canceled their nine-race card. Live racing will resume Friday afternoon with a traditional 1 p.m. CT post time and a nine-race card.

In an attempt to resolve years of federal Clean Water Act (CWA) violations at its Fair Grounds racetrack in New Orleans, Churchill Downs Louisiana Horseracing Company, LLC, has agreed to pay a $2.7 million penalty--the largest civil fine ever paid by a concentrated animal feeding operation in a CWA matter. Under the terms of the settlement announced Sept. 29 by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Justice (DOJ), the limited liability company that runs Fair Grounds must also implement $5.6 million in operational changes and...

It takes a lot of prospecting, a lot of false leads, a lot of patient drilling. When you do strike oil, however, the fulfilment of a single moment will suddenly indemnify all the barren endeavour in between. And that's equally true whether you are a geologist, trying to read the complexion of the land above mineral deposits; or a horseman, trying to find that latent seam of class beneath the surface hints of pedigree and conformation. Al Stall, Jr., having filled both roles in his time, recognizes the analogy. "Oh,...

Maggi Moss's No Parole (Violence), a 14 1/4-length debut winner here Dec. 15--good for a 90 Beyer Speed Figure--again proved too much for his Louisiana-bred foes to handle as he romped to become the third 'TDN Rising Star' of the day and second by Hill 'n' Dale's Violence. Off at prohibitive 1-5 odds, the $75,000 KEESEP yearling seized command early in the wet going, clicked off splits of :21.79 and :44.45 and cruised home all by his lonesome with just a couple of reminders before being geared down late to...