The California breeding programs will take center stage this weekend on TVG with live coverage of California Cup Day from Santa Anita featuring five stakes races on the ten-race card including the $200,000 California Cup Derby. A homebred for Jim Rome's Jungle Racing, Straight Up G will take on five rivals as he tries to earn his second consecutive stakes race.
TVG's Todd Schrupp, Simon Bray, Christina Blacker, Joaquin Jaime, Britney Eurton and Kurt Hoover will be reporting live from Santa Anita throughout the day with exclusive interviews, analysis and features. In the California Cup Derby, Straight Up G will be ridden by Ricardo Gonzalez for trainer Richard Baltas. A son of Straight Fire, he will be making his three-year-old debut and closed out his juvenile campaign with a win in the King Glorious Stakes at Los Alamitos.
Also on the card is the $150,000 Sunshine Millions Filly and Mare Turf Sprint which has drawn an overflow field of thirteen contenders. The field includes California Kook, a four-time winner and Grade 1-placed daughter of Boisterous, bred and owned in California by Wachtel Stable and Gary Barber. Trained by Rueben Alvarado, she was last seen winning an allowance race at Santa Anita and will have John Velazquez in the irons.
The coverage will continue with a special holiday card on Monday at Santa Anita featuring the $125,000 Astra Stakes (G3) going 1 ½ miles on the turf.
Gulfstream Park has a loaded eleven-race card featuring a pair of stakes races for Florida-bred horses – the $75,000 Sunshine Classic and $75,000 Sunshine Sprint. Larry Collmus and Andie Biancone will be reporting live from the track with interviews and expert analysis. Shamrocket headlines the Sunshine Classic as the 6-5 morning line favorite for Todd Pletcher. Owned by Donegal Racing, the five-year-old son of Tonalist will square off against six rivals under jockey Javier Castellano.
In addition to racing from Santa Anita and Gulfstream Park, TVG will be featuring racing from Oaklawn, Tampa Bay Downs, Fair Grounds, Aqueduct and more. Fans can tune in on TVG, TVG2 and the Watch TVG app which is available on Amazon Fire, Roku and connected Apple TV devices.
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