Todd Pletcher | Horse Racing Free Tips

Weekly Stewards and Commissions Rulings July 4-10

Every week, the TDN publishes a roundup of key official rulings from the primary tracks within the four major racing jurisdictions of California, New York, Florida and Kentucky. This week's appear below.

Here's a primer on how each of these jurisdictions adjudicates different offenses, what they make public (or not) and where.

California
Track: Los Alamitos
Date: 07/04/2022
Licensee: Diego Herrera, jockey
Penalty: One-day suspension, $250 fine
Violation: Excessive use of the whip
Explainer: Having violated the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2280 (Use of Riding Crop) and pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties–Class 3), Jockey Diego Herrera, who rode Wizard of Westwood in the seventh race at Los Alamitos Race Course on July 3, 2022, is suspended for ONE (1) day (July 22, 2022),and fined $250.00 for one (1) strike over the limit. Furthermore, Jockey Diego Herrera is assigned three (3) violation points that will be expunged on January 4, 2023, six (6) months from the date of final adjudication pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties).

Track: Los Alamitos
Date: 07/04/2022
Licensee: Ricardo Ramirez, jockey
Penalty: One-day suspension, $250 fine
Violation: Excessive use of the whip
Explainer: Having violated the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2280 (Use of Riding Crop) and pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties– Class 3), Apprentice Jockey Ricardo Ramirez, who rode It's My House in the eighth race at Los Alamitos Race Course on July 3, 2022, is suspended for ONE (1) day (July 22, 2022), and fined $250.00 for one (1) strike over the limit. Furthermore, Apprentice Jockey Ricardo Ramirez is assigned three (3) violation points that will be expunged on January 4, 2023, six (6) months from the date of final adjudication pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties).

Track: Los Alamitos
Date: 07/09/2022
Licensee: Cesar Ortega, jockey
Penalty: One-day suspension, $250 fine
Violation: Excessive use of the whip
Explainer: Having violated the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2280 (Use of Riding Crop) and pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties–Class 3), Jockey Cesar Ortega, who rode Trouble N Paradise in the first race at Los Alamitos Race Course on July 8, 2022, is suspended for ONE (1) day (July 22, 2022), and fined $250.00 for two (2) strikes over the limit. Furthermore, Jockey Cesar Ortega is assigned three (3) violation points that will be expunged on January 9, 2023, six (6) months from the date of final adjudication pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties).

Track: Los Alamitos
Date: 07/10/2022
Licensee: Ryan Curatolo, jockey
Penalty: One-day suspension, $250 fine
Violation: Excessive use of the whip
Explainer: Having violated the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2280 (Use of Riding Crop) and pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties–Class 3), Jockey Ryan Curatolo, who rode Today Matters in the fourth race at Los Alamitos Race Course on July 9, 2022, is suspended for ONE (1) day (July 22, 2022), and fined $250.00 for one (1) strike over the limit. Furthermore, Jockey Ryan Curatolo is assigned three (3) violation points that will be expunged on January 10, 2023, six (6) months from the date of final adjudication pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties).

Track: Los Alamitos
Date: 07/10/2022
Licensee: Ricardo Ramirez, jockey
Penalty: One-day suspension, $250 fine
Violation: Excessive use of the whip
Explainer: Having violated the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2280 (Use of Riding Crop) and pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties–Class 3), Apprentice Jockey Ricardo Ramirez, who rode SCRATCHY APACHE in the eighth race at Los Alamitos Race Course on July 9, 2022, is suspended for ONE (1) day (July 23, 2022), and fined $250.00 for one (1) strike over the limit. Furthermore, Apprentice Jockey Ricardo Ramirez is assigned three (3) violation points that will be expunged on January 10, 2023, six (6) months from the date of final adjudication pursuant to Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority Rule #2282 (Riding Crop Violations and Penalties– 2nd offense since July 4, 2022).

Florida

The following was posted on the Association of Racing Commissioners International's “Weekly Rulings” website.

Track: Gulfstream Park
Date: 06/29/2022
Licensee: Milton Munez, trainer
Penalty: $500 fine
Violation: Medication violation
Explainer: 11/5/2019 – Final Order – Case #2019-044770 – F.S. Chapter 550.2415 – violation = Flunixin. “J.P.'S ROSE” FINE IMPOSED. 6/29/2022 – Payment of Final Order Fine Received.

New York

Track: Belmont Park
Date: 07/10/2022
Licensee: Todd Pletcher, trainer
Penalty: $1,000 fine
Violation: Drug procedure misstep

As Saratoga Meeting Looms, Trainers Pletcher and Brown Are Ready to Fight for the Title

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY–For the last dozen or so years, the competition for the training title at Saratoga Race Course has become the Todd and Chad Show.

The next round of the now-annual summer showdown of heavyweights in upstate New York between Todd Pletcher and Chad Brown begins Thursday, the opening day of the 154th season of racing at Saratoga. Pletcher, 55, the all-time leader, will seek his 15th championship, named to honor the late great H. Allen Jerkens. Brown, 43, who just completed a record-smashing Belmont spring/summer season, is seeking his fifth, all since he ended a six-year run by Pletcher in 2016.

Winning the training and riding titles at Saratoga has always been a big deal and great sport at America's most important meet. Finishing atop the standings at the Spa has often helped make careers and provided credentials for Eclipse Awards and later the Hall of Fame.

Pletcher served notice that he was a budding superstar when he won the Saratoga crown in 1998 as a 31-year-old in his third full season as a head trainer. Brown grew up in nearby Mechanicville and embraced racing at the Spa, earned the first of his four-consecutive Eclipse Awards a few months after securing his title at the age of 37.

According to stats provided by Equibase, Pletcher and Brown have finished either first or second in the Saratoga standings since 2011. During that stretch, Pletcher won seven times, but Brown has won four of the last six, including a record 46 in 2018.

Starting in 2008, Brown's first full season as a trainer, Pletcher has won 416 of 1,950 Saratoga starts. He has won 103 stakes, 60 of them graded. Brown has produced some big numbers in recent years, four times finishing with 40 or more. He has 392 victories from 1,600 starts, with a total of 90 stakes wins, 48 of them graded.

Pletcher has found the bulk of his success on the dirt, winning 292 of 1,197 starts. He has 124 wins in 753 races on grass. Brown's stats are in sharp contrast: he has 128 wins from 542 dirt starts while securing 264 victories from 1,058 starts on the turf courses. In stakes, Pletcher has 76 wins on dirt and 27 on turf. Brown has 25 stakes win on dirt and 65 on grass.

Pletcher said that Brown might have the upper hand entering the season and said that he checks the standings that the New York Racing Association publishes during the 40-day meet.

“Oh, yeah. You've got to watch the scoreboard,” he said. “That's part of the fun. If you didn't do that you wouldn't care at all. Chad has built a very, very powerful stable. Saratoga is his hometown and he loves to win there. Looking at the situation right now, he's going to be very difficult to beat, for sure.”

Brown has always acknowledged that his success at Saratoga has been vitally important for his career and has said that winning GI Travers S. would be more personally satisfying for him than a victory in the GI Kentucky Derby. After initially being turned down for stalls in 2008, he won with the first horse he saddled at Saratoga in the first race on opening day. He said the six wins from 18 starts that summer gave him credibility and brought him new clients.

Entering this meet he is second to Steve Asmussen in 2022 earnings with $14.9 million, has GI Preakness S. winner Early Voting (Gun Runner) in his career-best group of 3-year-old colts, a slew of graded stakes winners and comes in from the impressive Belmont Park performance. Long the pursuer of Pletcher at the meet, Brown smiled and agreed that he is now the one being pursued, but said it will be a challenge to repeat after claiming his seventh-straight Belmont crown.

“It's hard to sustain,” he said. “I think you'll see last year we had a big Belmont meet, might not have broke the record, but a big Belmont meet. And then we started off Saratoga a little slow, we won some races, we had some stakes and stuff, but, really, we picked up the second half of the meet and we had a couple of huge days in that last third of the meet. Then we really ended up being strong and in front. I could see similar. I have some nice races marked early in the meet, but it's so hard to sustain this because you have to keep the horses in good form, you have to keep them healthy. When you win this many races, you're moving out of conditions, right? So you're moving up in class. Every horse, that won is going to go up now and the races are going to get harder. When you move up a class, move into a more difficult meet and moving up in class for the first time those races can be difficult for those horses.”

Brown said that while he aims for Saratoga, he did not pump the brakes at Belmont.

“I went all in at Belmont because, the old saying is 'you make hay when the sun shining,'” he said. “And when you're on the turf, and it's firm, and the races are going and the horses are healthy you run because the purses are very good at Belmont. They're not as high as these record purses that are going to be offered at Saratoga in all these conditions. This is amazing. And it's great for all the horsemen and our clients that pay all the bills.”

Since his initial championship 24 years ago, Pletcher has never been worse than third at Saratoga. He has been the runner-up seven times. He arrives at this meet ranked third in the national standings for earnings at $14.4 million. Like Brown, he saddled a Triple Crown series winner, Mo Donegal (Uncle Mo), the GI Belmont S. champ, who is injured and won't run at Saratoga. The Hall of Famer, who is the sport's leading career money winner, said he is still interested in winning the Spa meet.

“It's always fun to compete at Saratoga. It certainly means something,” he said. “I wouldn't say it means quite the same as the first one did. That one was extra special and unexpected in a lot of ways. Wouldn't have anticipated that could happen the third year there.

“I've always said, I have a great appreciation for how difficult it is to win at Saratoga. And we don't take anything for granted. As always, a lot of our success will depend on how our 2-year-olds run. I feel like we have a nice group, but I'm not positive that a lot of them are July types, probably more like mid- to late-August or even September, October types. We'll just have to see how they pan out.”

Even with Mo Donegal on the sidelines, Pletcher has a strong bench of stakes runners. In the last two weeks at Belmont he won the GII Suburban with Dynamic One (Union Rags), the GIII Dwyer S. with Charge It (Tapit) the GII John Nerud S. with Life is Good (Into Mischief), the Manila S. with Annapolis (War Front) and the Perfect Sting S. with Jouster (Noble Mission). In addition, he now trains Corniche, last year's 2-year-old champion, who is expected to make his first start for Pletcher at Saratoga.

“I obviously love the way July started out for us,” he said. “It's always good when you have the quality of horses that we ran and we've got some big targets of Saratoga so that that's exciting.”

The post As Saratoga Meeting Looms, Trainers Pletcher and Brown Are Ready to Fight for the Title appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

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Dynamic One Outlasts First Captain in Suburban Thriller

In a stretch-long battle reminiscent of the 2019 GI Jockey Club Gold Cup, in which the Todd Pletcher-trained Vino Rosso (Curlin) was controversially taken down for interfering with the Shug McGaughey-conditioned Code of Honor (Noble Mission {GB}), the former's Dynamic One (Union Rags) outslugged McGaughey's 'TDN Rising Star' First Captain (Curlin) to eke out the victory in Saturday's GII Suburban S. at Belmont Park.

The rail-drawn Untreated (Nyquist) hit the ground running and enjoyed an easy time of things up front, as defending champion Max Player (Honor Code) applied only token pressure. First Captain punched the breeze out wide, while Dynamic One was guided down to the inside by Irad Ortiz, Jr. for the long run down the backstretch.

Untreated still had things very much his own way racing into the final half-mile, but First Captain was given his cue about three furlongs from home, with Dynamic One following that move and poised to strike. The favorite was steered out deepest into the lane and appeared to be ready to blow the race apart in upper stretch, but First Captain refused to lie down while racing tightly between rivals and the duo raced in near lockstep through the final stages, with Dynamic One prevailing by a short head. Untreated boxed on gamely for third to complete a 1-3 for the stable.

“He's getting better. His mind is much better,” the winning jockey commented. “He's starting to figure out the game and he's changed a lot. He…switched up [leads] when I wanted to and he let me do my thing. Then he turned it on when I wanted to.”

Pletcher indicated that Dynamic One would make his next start in the Jockey Club Gold Cup–a 'Win and You're In' qualifier for the GI Breeders' Cup Classic–on closing weekend at Saratoga Sept. 3.

Outnodded for the victory in last year's GII Wood Memorial by barnmate Bourbonic (Bernardini), Dynamic One was well-beaten in the GI Kentucky Derby, but atoned with a defeat of Miles D (Curlin) and First Captain in the July 30 restricted Curlin S. at Saratoga. Rested off a seventh in the GI Runhappy Travers S. the next month, the $725,000 Keeneland September graduate was third to the in-form Scalding (Nyquist) in Tampa's GIII Challenger S. Mar. 12 and runner-up to the same foe in the GII Ben Ali S. at Keeneland Apr. 23 and was exiting a smart success in the June 4 Blame S. at Churchill.

Pedigree Notes:

Dynamic One is the 15th graded winner for his Lane's End-based stallion, whose finest hour as a racehorse came in the 2012 GI Belmont S. And he becomes yet another 2022 graded-stakes winner descending from a Phipps female family, as laid out by Sid Fernando in his July 6 Taking Stock column.

Dynamic One is the final Phipps-bred from his unplaced dam, a daughter of the Phippses 2002 champion 2-year-old filly Storm Flag Flying, who was also responsible for MGSP turfer Revved Up (Candy Ride {Arg}) and the dam of the Grade III-winning 'TDN Rising Star' Jouster (Noble Mission {GB}), who added to her resume with a victory for Pletcher in the July 3 Perfect Sting S. over the local grass course.

Third dam My Flag was unlucky not to win an Eclipse statuette of her own, given her thrilling victory in the 1995 GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies at Big Sandy, Grade I tallies at three in the GI Ashland S., GI CCA Oaks and GI Gazelle H. and a third-place effort in that year's GI Belmont S. My Flag, a daughter of undefeated legend Personal Ensign (Private Account), was a half-sister to JCGC winner Miner's Mark and fellow GISW Traditionally and her daughter Sound the Trumpets (Bernardini) produced the aforementioned Miles D.

Beat the Drums was purchased by Riverbend Farm for $400,000 in foal to Honor Code at the 2018 Keeneland November Sale and produced the colt Videri, a $260,000 KEESEP purchase who remains unraced for Centennial Farms. She is also the dam of a yearling Ghostzapper colt and a filly foal by Street Sense.

Saturday, Belmont Park
SUBURBAN S.-GII, $388,000, Belmont, 7-9, 4yo/up, 1 1/4m, 2:01.26, ft.
1–DYNAMIC ONE, 118, c, 4, by Union Rags
                1st Dam: Beat the Drums, by Smart Strike
                2nd Dam: Storm Flag Flying, by Storm Cat
                3rd Dam: My Flag, by Easy Goer
1ST GRADED STAKES WIN. ($725,000 Ylg '19 KEESEP).
O-Repole Stable, Phipps Stable & St Elias Stable; B-Phipps
Stable (KY); T-Todd A Pletcher; J-Irad Ortiz Jr. $220,000.
Lifetime Record: 12-4-3-1, $699,950. Werk Nick Rating: A+++
*Triple Plus*. Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.
2–First Captain, 120, c, 4, Curlin–America, by A.P. Indy.
($1,500,000 Ylg '19 FTSAUG). 'TDN Rising Star'. O-West Point
Thoroughbreds, Siena Farm LLC, Bobby Flay & Woodford
Racing LLC; B-B Flay Thoroughbreds (KY); T-Claude R
McGaughey III. $80,000.
3–Untreated, 118, c, 4, Nyquist–Fully Living, by Unbridled's
Song. ($550,000 Ylg '19 KEESEP; $300,000 3yo '21 KEEJAN).
O-Team Valor International LLC; B-Ashview Farm & Old Oak
Farm (KY); T-Todd A Pletcher. $48,000.
Margins: NO, 3/4, 7 3/4. Odds: 0.90, 1.90, 5.60.
Also Ran: Max Player, Forewarned.
Click for the Equibase.com chart, the TJCIS.com PPs or the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree. VIDEO, sponsored by TVG.

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Jockey/Horsemen Basketball Game In Saratoga Aug. 4

Edited Press Release

The 13th annual jockeys-versus-horsemen charity basketball game, which benefits the programs of the New York Race Track Chaplaincy (NYRTC), will be played Thursday, Aug. 4, 2022, at the Saratoga Springs Recreation Center at 6:30 p.m.

The game is one of the most popular events on the Saratoga social calendar and routinely attracts more than 300 fans. Admission is free.

The jockey team will once again be coached by Hall of Fame jockey Angel Cordero, Jr., with trainer Todd Pletcher and agent Kiaran McLaughlin coaching the horsemen team. Mitch Levites will serve as the announcer and provide lively commentary.

“This game is always immensely fun and beyond that, it raises much-needed funds to support our various programs,” said Humberto Chavez, the New York Chaplaincy lead chaplain and executive director. “Saratogians and so many of the fans who spend time in Saratoga have been great supporters of those who take care of the horses behind the scenes.”

Fans will be able to participate in raffles and one lucky fan will leave with a custom, autographed bobblehead of champion jockey Irad Ortiz, Jr.

NYRTC provides the backstretch community with children's enrichment, social service, and recreational programs, as well as educational opportunities, and non-denominational religious services.

Horsemen, individuals, or organizations who would like to sponsor the game may do so via the NY Chaplaincy website at www.rtcany.org or by contacting Eleanor Poppe at info@rtcany.org or 516-428-5267.

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