Horse Racing News

Home Sweet Aspen is likely bound for the Grade 1 La Brea Stakes at Santa Anita on Dec. 31, which makes her appearance in Wednesday's $60,000 Cool Air Stakes at Hollywood Park a key tune-up for that major stakes.

Royal Delta, winner of the Breeders' Cup Ladies' Classic, has returned to the barn of trainer Bill Mott and is being pointed to the $10 million Dubai World Cup next year, Mott said on Monday.

Ancient Rome made his stakes debut a winning one, surging from between horses in the final 40 yards under jockey Joe Rocco Jr. to outfinish For Oby by a nose to capture the $100,000 Spectacular Bid Stakes.

C R K Stable's Kettle Corn was content to run in fourth while saving ground in Saturday's Grade 3, $100,000 Native Diver Handicap at Hollywood Park, then put in a game rally up the rail to deny 8-5 favorite Tres Borrachos by a half-length on the wire.

When last seen Chilean-bred Casablanca Smile was finishing second in the $100,000 La Prevoyante Handicap in January.

The 2011 Calder racing season ends one month earlier than usual but will go out with a bang as Friday's 10-race closing-day program features a pair of Grade 3 stakes on the grass, the $150,000 La Prevoyante and $100,000 Tropical Turf handicaps.

The Spectacular Bid Stakes has traditionally been the first stakes of the Gulfstream Park meet for 3-year-olds. After a change in the meet schedule, it is now the opening day stakes for 2-year-olds.

John Veitch filed an appeal of his dismissal on Wednesday with the Kentucky Personnel Board, contending that he has been discriminated against because of his age and that the state violated his rights by failing to provide a cause for his dismissal.

General Quarters, the two-time Grade 1 winner who made his septuagenarian owner-trainer one of the most popular Kentucky Derby stories of recent years, was retired Monday after finishing last of 13 in the Clark Handicap.

John Veitch was dismissed as chief state steward for the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission on Monday, according to his lawyer.