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Carava To Cease Training to Become Jockey’s Agent

Jack Carava, who saddled better than 1,100 winners in a career dating back to 1986, has announced he is trading in his stopwatch in exchange for a condition book, as he will book mounts on behalf of Tyler Baze beginning with the Santa Anita fall meet Sept. 19. Baze is returning to California following an eight-month absence.

“The time is right,” said Carava, 54, who has operated both a public and private stable in Southern California for the past 33 years. “I’ve had a lot of success with Tyler over the years and he’s probably the hardest-working jock I’ve ever known. I love training, but my stable has contracted over the past couple years and when Tyler called me, I realized this is a great opportunity.”

Carava, the son of a trainer, worked for Jerry Fanning and Joe Griffin before launching his own stable in 1987. Carava celebrated the best year of his career in 2001, sending out 74 winners from 355 starters (21%) and was the leading conditioner at the Hollywood Park Spring/Summer meeting that year and at the Oak Tree at Santa Anita meet in 2002. He retires with stable earnings of $32.4 million and five graded wins, including the 2006 GI Bing Crosby H. with Washington-bred Pure As Gold (Stolen Gold).

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After ‘Tough’ Year, Kentucky Downs Meet Comes At A Good Time For Trainer Joe Sharp

The RUNHAPPY Meet at Kentucky Downs couldn't come soon enough for Joe Sharp.

The trainer has always done well at the all-grass meet. That includes winning at Kentucky Downs with the first starter after opening his own stable in 2014, with Holiday Drama ridden by Sharp's wife, Rosie Napravnik. He has won at least one race every Kentucky Downs meet since. Last year Sharp earned a share of the training title with Wesley Ward and Ian Wilkes at four wins apiece. That ended the run of four straight Kentucky Downs meet titles for Sharp's former boss, the track's all-time win leader Mike Maker.

Sharp has Midnight Tea Time and Hierarchy entered in Wednesday's $300,000 Tapit Stakes for horses who haven't won a stakes in 2020. Hierarchy was cross-entered in Saturday's $1 million Calumet Farm Kentucky Turf Cup, one of five stakes on the showcase Calumet Farm Day card. Sharp also entered the stakes-winner Quebec in the $500,000, Grade 3 Real Solution Ladies Sprint and Fast Boat in the $700,000, Grade 3 RUNHAPPY Turf Sprint among his five entries Saturday. Fast Boat needs two scratches to run in the overfilled RUNHAPPY Turf Sprint, whose winner receives a fees-paid spot in the $1 million Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint (G1) with the six-furlong stakes being a Breeders' Cup Challenge Series' “Win And You're In” race.

“Kentucky Downs has been a track that's been really good to us over the years,” Sharp said. “Being based here in Kentucky, you know what kind of horses to look for, what kind of distances to target over there.

“I was telling my wife, we can make our whole year this month. In a normal year, it's a really, really fun place to go to the races. You can bring the family and enjoy it. It's real casual. That's one of my favorite parts about it. I was saying my favorite day of the year is when they take entries for opening day at Kentucky Downs. The track just has a great feeling to it.”

This has been a difficult year for Sharp, to put it mildly. He had to undergo surgeries June 4 and July 24 connected to a brain tumor, with a procedure in between to insert a lumbar drain. The good news was that the tumor, known as an acoustic neuroma, was non-cancerous. The bad news was that in order to remove it, the surgeons also had to remove auditory nerves that had wrapped around it, rendering him deaf in his right ear.

Because the tumor was benign and he knew he was going to lose his hearing in an ear, Sharp said he delayed surgery for a year. Amid that, he had a rash of horses at Churchill Downs last fall and the Fair Grounds disqualified for testing over the limit for the dewormer Levamisole.

“It just keeps coming this year, for sure,” Sharp said. “But we're tough…. We're going on and doing our thing. We've always had a good reputation prior to that. It was just unlucky. I think if I had to guess after talking to veterinarians and specialists that most likely the horses were recontaminating the stalls. That's why it's carried on. There's no other explanation.”

Sharp said he almost had his surgery last November “but I chickened out… There's never a good time for that.

“I'd never even broken a bone,” said the 35-year-old former jockey, who until being grounded by the surgeries got on many of his horses in morning training. “So I've been very lucky. That being said, I'm not the best patient ever because I wasn't used to that. I've never been unfit since I was 16. I couldn't lift over 10 pounds for 90 days and then when I had my second surgery, that started over again. So like the kids, the barn, I can't bend down. That was the toughest part.”

One of Sharp's four wins last year at Kentucky Downs came with a maiden called Art Collector. Unfortunately for Sharp, one of his Levamisole disqualifications came in a subsequent Churchill Downs allowance race in which Art Collector finished first by 7 1/2 lengths. Owner Bruce Lunsford, who had sent Art Collector to trainer Tommy Drury to bring back off a layoff, opted to keep the colt with Drury. They are 4 for 4 since, including winning Keeneland's Grade 2 Toyota Blue Grass and the $200,000 Ellis Park Derby. After missing the Derby with a minor but untimely foot issue, Art Collector is being pointed for the Oct. 3 Preakness Stakes.

Sharp said he continues to have a good relationship with Lunsford and harbors no hard feelings about losing Art Collector. With his surgeries, he noted it would have been difficult to have a horse on the delayed Kentucky Derby trail anyway.

Mostly, Sharp is grateful just to be back at the track, returning a little more than two weeks ago. Midnight Tea Time got the scratch he needed to get into Wednesday's Tapit off the also-eligible list. In his last start he was second by a neck in a third-level allowance race won by He's No Lemon, an unusual result where both horses in the exacta are out of the same mare, It's Tea Time. (As an aside, He's No Lemon is entered in the Calumet Farm Kentucky Turf Cup.) Midnight Tea Time won a second-level allowance race at Kentucky Downs last year by a nose over Combatant, who went on to win the Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap.

Sharp said that a final decision will be made with owner Carl Moore but that they believe the Kentucky Turf Cup's 1 1/2-mile distance will suit Hierarchy. Hierarchy was a good second in the Kentucky Downs Preview Turf Cup won by Factor This, who then was second in last Saturday's Grade 1 Old Forester Bourbon Turf Classic at Churchill Downs.

“He's a horse we've always wanted to try going that far,” Sharp said. “He ran really big going a mile and a quarter against Factor This, got a really big (handicapping) number. There are limited opportunities to find a race going a mile and a half. If he fires and runs his last two numbers back, he's very competitive with these horses. Obviously Zulu Alpha is in top form right now. Arklow's form isn't what it was last year at this time, but he's still consistent. Honestly I think it comes down to what distance is going to suit him better, because the Tapit came up pretty tough as well.”

Sharp believes firmer turf will help Quebec, a $105,000 purchase at Keeneland's November sale last fall, in the Ladies Sprint.

“She ran some really good races at Lone Star for us,” Sharp said of a pair of seconds before Quebec finished seventh in the Kentucky Downs Preview Ladies Turf. “The day we ran her at Ellis Park, it was boggy. She's a California horse. They like to hear their feet rattle. So we're going to cut her back in distance to 6 1/2 furlongs. That uphill, I think she'll really like.”

Sharp's best finish opening day was a third but he's optimistic about the rest of the meet, saying, “I think our meet will get stronger as it goes, as far as entries are concerned.”

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Trainer Mike Maker Enters ‘Only’ Ten On Opening Day At Kentucky Downs

Trainer Mike Maker told his barn crew to enjoy an easy day Monday when the RUNHAPPY Meet at Kentucky Downs kicks off its six-date run featuring exclusively grass racing.

“I said to the guys at the barn, 'You guys can have a light opening day and then after that we'll pick it up a little bit,” Maker, Kentucky Downs' all-time winningest trainer, said cheerfully. “We entered nine the first day, and we have 15 to 20 every other day.”

Entries for opening day were taken Wednesday with 154 horses making the program: 127 in the body for the 11-race card and another 27 needing defections in order to get in off the also-eligible list. Post time for the first race is 12:10 p.m. Central.

Maker actually wound up having 10 entries Monday, with three needing scratches to run. Among those he entered are Parlor and Hembree in the $750,000 Tourist Mile, the last of four stakes on the WinStar Farm Day card. The capacity field of 12 also includes 2019 winner Snapper Sinclair and Grade 1 winner Next Shares.

Maker claimed Parlor for $80,000 last November at the Fair Grounds for owners Michael Hui, Hooties Racing and WSS Racing. Hui also owns Zulu Alpha. After two races, Maker added blinkers to Parlor, and the 6-year-old gelding responded with four strong efforts, including third by a total of a half-length to multiple graded-stakes winner Factor This in Churchill Downs' Grade 2 Wise Dan and a nose defeat in Keeneland's Grade 1 Maker's Mark Mile won by 2019 Preakness winner War of Will.

“When we claimed him, he had a little bit of a throat issue that we worked on,” Maker said of Parlor. “That seems to be corrected. I'd like to think that's the basis for his improvement. The blinkers were more or less to get him involved a little early.”

The Tourist Mile will be Parlor's fifth year to run at Kentucky Downs, having finished second by a neck (Kentucky Downs Juvenile), second by three-quarters of a length (Dueling Grounds Derby), third (Old Friends, now known as the Tapit Stakes) and ninth in last year's Tourist Mile.

Three Diamonds Farm's Hembree was claimed 2 1/2 years ago for $50,000 and is one of Maker's many claims to become graded-stakes winners on turf. He was fourth in last year's Tourist Mile after winning a Kentucky Downs allowance race in 2018. Hembree most recently was third behind Tourist contender Spectacular Gem in Ellis Park's $100,000 Kentucky Downs Preview Tourist Mile.

Maker has the intriguing Indy Tourist in the $500,000 More Than Ready Juvenile. The other stakes Monday are the $500,000 The Mint Juvenile Fillies and the $300,000 One Dreamer for fillies and mares who haven't won a stakes in 2020.

“We had high hopes on him,” Maker said of Indy Tourist, adding of a 12-length defeat in Indy Tourist's debut, “We ran him at Churchill Downs first time and he stood in the gate, lost all chance and then came back and won by like 16 at Indiana.” Not to nitpick, but it was 15 3/4 lengths on turf at the More Than Ready Juvenile's mile distance.

The Maker arsenal includes the defending champ in the $1 million, Grade 3 Calumet Farm Kentucky Turf Cup in Zulu Alpha. The 1 1/2-mile Turf Cup heads the five-stakes extravaganza on the Sept. 12 Calumet Farm Day at Kentucky Downs. Zulu Alpha kick-started his 2020 season by taking Gulfstream Park's Grade 1, $1 million Pegasus World Cup Turf. His only defeat in four starts this year was a fast-flying second while losing the Grade 2 Kitten's Joy Pan American to stablemate Bemma's Boy by a neck.

“He's breathing fire, ready to roll,” Maker said of Zulu Alpha.

Maker entered Tiger Blood, a $62,500 claim by Parlor's ownership group, in Friday's Grade 2, $250,000 Twin Spires Turf Sprint at Churchill Downs but said he is likely to scratch to run in Kentucky Downs' $750,000, Grade 3 RUNHAPPY Turf Sprint on Sept. 12, a race whose winner gets a fees-paid spot in the $1 million Breeders' Cup Turf Sprint Nov. 7 at Keeneland.

“He's an old classy horse,” he said. “He hasn't won for us yet, but maybe this will be the one.”

Skychai Racing's Jolting Joe, who finished second in his racing debut last year at Kentucky Downs behind Keeneland's Grade 2 Toyota Blue Grass winner Art Collector, is being pointed for the Sept. 10 $750,000 Gun Runner Dueling Grounds Derby, Maker said. The New York-bred Joltin Joe reeled off four seconds (including to Tampa Bay Derby winner and Arkansas Derby runner-up King Guillermo) before earning his first victory in a $100,000 New York Stallion Series Stakes at Saratoga in his last start.

Maker's 55 career wins tops Kentucky Downs' all-time standings, with Wesley Ward second at 32. Maker's $7,394,565 in purse earnings dwarfs Ward's $3,448,575, which also ranks second all-time.

However, Maker's run of four straight Kentucky Downs training titles, with a combined 33 victories, ended last year when he won only three races. The title, at four wins, was shared by Joe Sharp, Ian Wilkes and Ward. But Maker also had a track-record 14 seconds which helped him easily win the money title with purse earnings of $1,435,771, almost double Rusty Arnold's next-best $791,094.

“Like I told everybody, second-place finishes at Kentucky Downs are like winning at other tracks.… Titles are nice. You always like to win if you can,” Maker said, adding with a laugh. “But like I said, if I had to pick between the two, I'd prefer to have the money title.”

Maker has more starts — 301 — than any trainer in Kentucky Downs history dating to when he went 0 for 5 in 2003, according to equineline.com statistics. If Maker runs a lot of horses, he's also said in the past, “You should see all the horses that didn't get in,” referencing Kentucky Downs' tendency to get more entries for a race than the maximum 12 that can start. This meet, Maker estimates that he will enter “75 to 80” horses, or about a third of his stable.

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Karl Broberg Repeats As Leading Trainer At Evangeline Downs

There was a long time during the Thoroughbred season at Evangeline Downs this summer where it appeared that Karl Broberg would not defend the training title he has won so many times before. That was until the night of August 19, when horses trained by Broberg won six of the nine races on the program and catapulted him back to the top of the standings. Broberg totaled 23 wins for the season, which was six more than a three-way tie for second at 17 wins between Sam David, Jr., Ron Faucheux and Eduardo Ramirez. For the season, Broberg's horses earned $374,150 in purse money, which also topped the table.

The complete top 10 trainers' standings were: Karl Broberg (23 wins), a three-way tie for second with Sam David, Jr., Ron Faucheux, and Eduardo Ramirez at 17 wins each, a three-way tie for fifth with Allen Landry, Lee Thomas and Dale White, Sr. at 15 wins each, a two-way tie for eighth with Keith Bourgeois and Bret Calhoun at 14 wins each and a three-way tie for ninth with Sam Breaux, Kenneth Hargrave and Corale Richards at 13 wins each.

Tim Thornton handily won the jockeys' title at Evangeline Downs in 2020 with 73 victories from 339 starts for a 22% winning percentage. When you add 71 second-place and 47 third-place finishes to his record, that gives Thornton an in-the-money percentage for the season of 56%. Thornton and runner-up Diego Saenz were the only riders whose mounts earned in excess of one million dollars in purse money with Thornton's horses picking up $1,268,850 and Saenz's earning $1,050,461.

The complete top 10 jockeys' standings were: Tim Thornton (73 wins), Diego Saenz (56), Gerard Melancon (46), Devin Magnon (31), Jansen Melancon (26), Ty Kennedy (25), C.J. McMahon (22), Joe Stokes (21), and a two-way tie for ninth between Jarred Journet and E.M. Murray at 18 wins each.

It was a stellar season for Dale White, Sr. at Evangeline Downs. White not only finished in the top five in the training standings, he also managed to finish the meet as the leading owner with 14 victories from 84 starts, ending up four wins ahead of a tie for second between Elite Thoroughbred Racing LLC and End Zone Athletics, Inc. White also added 13 seconds and 17 thirds for an in-the-money percentage of 52% for his runners. His horses earned $248,180 in purses, which was also led the standings.

The complete top 10 owners' standings were: Dale White, Sr. (14 wins), a two-way tie for seconds with Elite Thoroughbred Racing LLC and End Zone Athletics, Inc. at 10 wins each, a two-way tie for fourth with Earl Hernandez, Keith Hernandez & John Duvieilh and Red Rose Racing at 9 wins each, a two-way tie for sixth with Rylee Grudzien and M & M Racing at 7 wins each and a three-way tie for eighth between Allied Racing Stable, LLC, Norman Stables, LLC and Whispering Oaks Farm, LLC at 6 wins each.

Live racing at Evangeline Downs will resume on September 17 with the beginning of the American Quarter Horse meeting. Post time for the season will be 5:35 pm Central Time.

For more information on racing at Evangeline Downs, visit the track's website at www.evdracing.com. Evangeline Downs' Twitter handle is @EVDRacing and the racetrack is also accessible on Facebook at www.facebook.com/EvangelineDownsRacing.

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