Horse Racing News

After an unsuccessful Triple Crown campaign, Optimizer looks to have found his home back on the turf. The D. Wayne Lukas-trained colt captured his first graded stakes win in record fashion on Saturday in the Grade 3, $200,000 Kent Stakes.

J. Paul Reddam's Handsome Mike parlayed a front-running trip into a two-length upset in Saturday's Grade 2, $1 million Pennsylvania Derby, winning as the 19-1 longest shot at Parx Racing.

Last year's unbeaten champion two-year-old filly My Miss Aurelia outdueled pro tem divisional leader Questing by a head in Saturday's $971,200 Cotillion Stakes at Parx, in a climactic finish to the first Grade 1 event ever staged in Pennsylvania.

Dust and Diamonds, getting good at the right time, disposed of her better-known rivals Musical Romance and Turbulent Descent with ease in capturing the $200,000 Gallant Bloom Handicap by 1 1/4 lengths at Belmont Park Sept. 22.

Grade 1 winner and multi-millionaire Awesome Gem has been retired from racing, according to West Point Thoroughbreds.

Zayat Stables' Haskell Invitational winner Paynter has beaten laminitis and will be able to race again if he beats colitis, his owner said Sept. 21.

American Derby winner Cozzetti seeks a return to winning ways in the $200,000 Kent Stakes at Delaware Park Sept. 22, but plenty of new rivals are ready to take him on after his sixth-place finish in the Aug. 18 Secretariat Stakes.

Saturday's Grade 2 $200,000 Gallant Bloom Handicap at Belmont Park serves as a dynamite prep for this year's Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint at Santa Anita on November 2.

Very few fillies were up for the challenge of facing undefeated 2-year-old champion My Miss Aurelia and two-time Grade 1 winner Questing in the Sept. 22 Cotillion Stakes at Parx Racing Sept. 22.

Kiaran McLaughlin, trainer of Alpha, and Kenny McPeek, trainer of Golden Ticket, both said they were thrilled with the result of the Travers.