Jorge Navarro | Horse Racing Free Tips

Sloppy Track Won’t Be Problem For Premier Star In Wednesday’s Jersey Shore Stakes

The initial scouting report that Michael Trombetta received when he took over the training of Premier Star this spring was pretty basic.

“All they told me when I got him was that he was a very nice horse,” Trombetta said.

What the veteran conditioner has found out since then is that the son of Tapiture has the ability to be a top-notch sprinter, maybe even one with a graded stakes-winning future. For now, Wednesday's $100,000 Jersey Shore Stakes at Monmouth Park is the next step toward that, with Premier Star set to take on nine other 3-year-olds in the six-furlong feature, including stablemate Newstome.

Trained by Jorge Navarro for his first three career starts, Premier Star opened with two impressive victories before faltering in the Grade 3 Sam Davis.

Trombetta has had the colt for his three starts since then, the most recent being a third-place finish in the Grade 2 Amsterdam Stakes at Saratoga on Aug. 29. In that race, Premier Star finished four lengths behind race winner Yaupon, a leading contender for the Breeders' Cup Sprint trained by Steve Asmussen, and was two lengths behind multiple Grade 1 winner Basin.

“The first time I ran him (a fourth-place finish at Laurel) he took a bad stumble leaving the gate and it really compromised his chances,” said Trombetta. “Then we were able to get things going much better after that.

“He won his next start and then we took him to Saratoga for the Amsterdam. As tough as that race was he showed up in a good way and ran credible.”

The Amsterdam was contested over a muddy track, which is significant given the two days of steady rain Monmouth Park has had Monday and Tuesday.

“He can deal with a sloppy track,” Trombetta said. “I think he will be fine if it's off. Quite frankly, it's getting late in the season for 3-year-olds so we only have so many opportunities left.”

Owned by Sonata Stable, the Kentucky-bred Premier Star has won three of his six career starts, with two of the defeats in graded stakes and the other because of a stumbled start.

But he does have his limitations.

“I don't know if he's truly a two-turn horse. Hopefully at some point he can be,” Trombetta said. “Hopefully he can go a little bit further. We would certainly entertain seven furlongs for sure and maybe a one-turn mile. Whether he is a two-turn horse or not only time will tell.”

For this race, Premier Star is at his optimal distance, facing a solid mix of sophomore runners. The field includes the Kelly Breen-trained As Seen On TV, who is back sprinting after lackluster effort in the Pegasus Stakes at Monmouth Park in his last start. He was similarly unimpressive in the Grade 1 Florida Derby after a third-place finish in the Grade 2 Fountain of Youth.

Newstome, Stidham's other entry in the race, will mark his 10th straight stakes appearance, but is just 1-for-5 as a 3-year-old after winning three of five starts at 2. The son of Goldencents has four career victories and has banked $226,646.

First race post time for the eight-race card on Wednesday is 12:50 p.m.

The post Sloppy Track Won’t Be Problem For Premier Star In Wednesday’s Jersey Shore Stakes appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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Still Embattled In Civil Suit, Ahmed Zayat Files For Chapter 7 Bankruptcy, Listing String Of Racing Creditors

Ahmed Zayat, best known in horse racing as the owner of 2015 Triple Crown winner American Pharoah through his Zayat Stables, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection on Sept. 8. Paperwork filed in United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey lists a long string of trainers, veterinarians, transport companies, and others as creditors for expenses totaling tens of millions of dollars.

Unlike Chapter 13 or 11 bankruptcy, Chapter 7 does not involve the filing of a repayment plan. Rather, a bankruptcy trustee is appointed to gather and sell assets and pay creditors when possible. Some of the debtor's property may be exempt, but anything nonexempt will be liquidated.

A lengthy list of creditors attached to the filing revealed a number of horse trainers owed amounts in the six figures, among them Bob Baffert, who is owed $227,884.17, Brad Cox ($194,836.19), Mike Maker ($120,921.88), Richard Baltas ($316,070.12), Steve Asmussen ($102,541.10) and Todd Pletcher ($125,598.69). Rudy Rodriguez, who was awarded a judgment by a New York court for $394,437.19, is also listed. Jorge Navarro's JN Racing is owed $63,822.01.

Veterinary hospitals Hagyard Equine Medical ($38,999.53), Rood and Riddle ($54,346.77), and Kentucky Equine Medical Associates ($19,937.32) are also on the list, as are numerous therapists, individual veterinarians, van companies, and others.

Several financial advisement companies and individuals are listed, with notes they are owed six or seven figures each. One $250,000 debt is listed for the PMG Operating Account, whose address corresponds to Meadows Gaming.

Some, though not all, of these creditors' claims are marked as disputed.

Zayat and his racing operation were named in a civil lawsuit earlier this year in Fayette County Circuit Court from New York investment firm MGG Investments, stemming from a $30 million loan he took out in 2016. MGG won a summary judgment in the amount of $24.5 million earlier this year, representing the remaining balance Zayat Stables owes on the loan. Zayat Stables has countersued, and the bankruptcy paperwork listed the final amount owed to MGG as unknown for the moment. Control of Zayat Stables has been placed into the hands of a court-appointed receiver, who has raced a few of the stable's remaining horses and sold many of them, with an aim to maximize profit in the court of liquidating the operation.

Cedarview Capital, a New York hedge fund, is owed $7.9 million. In documents filed as part of the MGG suit, Zayat indicated he had paid over $1 million in interest to Cedarview, and stated it was one of the lenders he took on alongside MGG. In emails dated January of this year, Zayat claimed to have traveled to China in an attempt to attract investors to inject cash into the stable in order to “make the company fiscally functional” and to repay MGG and Cedarview.

In 2009, Zayat Stable filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after Zayat was sued by Fifth Third Bank for allegedly defaulting on $34 million in equine loans.

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Op/Ed: A Critical Step Forward for the Sport

When 27 individuals were indicted in March by federal authorities for their alleged involvement in a wide-spread doping scheme the story was about more than Jason Servis or Jorge Navarro or the cocktails of performance-enhancing drugs they were charged with using on their horses. It was about a system that was so hopelessly broken and incapable of effectively policing the sport that it took the federal government to come in and do what racing had continually failed to do–take meaningful steps to clean up the game.

There had to be a better way.

Monday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, surrounded by industry leaders and Congressman Andy Barr, provided just that. The McConnell bill, the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act, may not be perfect, but is a vast improvement on what we have now. Passage of the bill would mean the dismantling of a system that involves 38 racing commissions, 38 sets of rules and a long history of getting nothing done and replace it with something that promises to combat the sport’s real problems.

“As I have said many times, this legislative effort is not about more regulation it is about creating a single nationwide set of rules that will result in smarter, more effective and streamlined regulation for the industry,” said Barr, whose district includes Lexington.

It was ironic that McConnell is now the white knight who has come in to save the sport from itself after it was long felt that he was the primary reason previous legislation, the Horseracing Integrity Act, seemed destined to go nowhere. The story was that Churchill Downs Inc. (CDI) didn’t want that bill passed and McConnell had promised them to stand in its way. Yet, CDI CEO Bill Carstanjen was among those who spoke out at Keeneland Monday in favor of McConnell’s initiative.

It’s unclear why there was an apparent change of heart somewhere, but it doesn’t really matter. With McConnell behind what is bipartisan legislation and with Barr taking up the cause in the House of Representatives, this bill is likely to sail through. For that to happen would mark major, long overdo and very necessary change for an industry where nothing substantive ever seems to get accomplished.

The Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act and the creation of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority is about more than just doping. It recognizes the very important challenges that must be tackled when it comes to making the sport as safe as possible and keeping racing’s harshest critics off its back.

But it is the ugly issue of doping that this initiative holds the greatest promise. Servis, Navarro and others may be headed to prison and will likely never train a race horse again, but everyone knows that there are many bad apples still out there and that the FBI and Department of Justice will soon move on from horse racing and leave the job of regulating the sport to the racing commissions and the labs that never seem to catch anybody.

McConnell noted that he was moved to act after the Washington Post reacted to the indictments by running an editorial calling for the sport to be abolished. He understood the power of those words.

“When I saw in the Washington Post, of all places, an editorial saying Thoroughbred horse racing should be abolished, I gasped,” McConnell said. “When I got past the initial shock of it, I thought it might be a good time to talk to all the various players and see one more time if it were possible for all of us to get together.”

Under the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act, the job of catching the bad guys will be turned over to the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA). Having, among other things, brought down Lance Armstrong, USADA has an impressive record of policing the sports that have called on the agency. USADA not only has a will to clean up the sport, it has more tools at its disposal than a state racing commission could ever have and promises to dramatically increase the number of out-of-competition tests that will be performed.

After the indictments were announced in March, USADA CEO Travis Tygart repeated what has become a familiar argument.

“With the horse racing industry at a crossroads, the right thing to do is to remove the fox from guarding the henhouse and ensure there is an independent anti-doping body in place to protect the integrity of the sport and the safety of the horses,” he said in a statement.

Monday’s announcement left many questions unanswered, most notably who will pay for the costs, which include USADA, that passage of the bill will involve. For now, we have to trust that racing’s stewards will be able to figure that out. And the sport still awaits an answer on whether or not this legislation might mean a complete ban of Lasix.

So far as the bigger picture goes, those are not major issues. This is about tearing down a system that has failed miserably and replacing it with something that promises to take the sport in another direction. Racing will never be perfect. Horses will always break down and have to be euthanized and you are never going to stop people from cheating. But racing can and must do better. Passage of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act is its best chance to do just that.

The post Op/Ed: A Critical Step Forward for the Sport appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Report: Navarro Had Judge’s Authorization For Ocala Move, ‘Shall Have No Contact’ With Racehorses

Trainer Jorge Navarro, one of the defendants in a federal case based around alleged doping of racehorses, received approval this week to move to Ocala, Fla. According to the Thoroughbred Daily News, an order from U.S. Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil would allow Navarro to reside in Ocala and travel to South Florida to meet with his attorney or specific family members.

The order also states he “shall have no contact whatsoever with racehorses.”

On Thursday, this publication released an investigative report on program trainers which included a look at Tomahawk Racing Stable, a new ownership entity in South Florida which has exclusively run horses with previous ties to Navarro's barn. Gulfstream Park officials say they have monitored the transfer of all former Navarro-trained or owned horses carefully, and that Navarro is not training horses on-site at its facilities.

Ocala is home to a number of private training centers which do not fall under the jurisdiction of state racing regulators or racetrack ownership. Although those facilities are permitted to post official workouts to a horse's record through Equibase, there is often no oversight on who is handling or conditioning horses based at such facilities.