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Canterbury Park racing officials have canceled horse racing for June 22 due to projected heat indexes in excess of 105.

Ellis Park will launch its 25-day summer meet July 3, headlined by record stakes purses, top racing connections, fan-friendly wagering menus, and a full calendar of community events both on and off the track.

Vahva returned to form with a victory in the Chicago Stakes (G2) June 21 at Churchill Downs, a win that snapped a three-race losing streak that dated back to her victory in last year's edition of this seven-furlong sprint for older fillies and mares.

Never traveling beyond a mile before June 21, Mo Plex handled his first two-turn test with aplomb in the $500,000 Ohio Derby (G3) at Thistledown.

John and Thady Gosden were crowned the leading trainers at the Royal Ascot meet, with their brilliant week headlined by Field of Gold's superstar performance in the June17 St James's Palace Stakes (G1).

Equine star power will be on display June 28 at Churchill Downs, and not just in the day's feature, the $1 million Stephen Foster Stakes (G1).

With projected heat indexes in excess of 105 well into the evening, Canterbury Park has canceled the June 21 Northern Stars Turf Festival program that had been scheduled to begin at 5 p.m. CT.

Gary Subratie, a trainer who has saddled more than 800 winners in Jamaica, recorded his first U.S. win Saturday at Gulfstream Park. His charge Rogers Park (Kantharos) captured the sixth race, a $12,500 maiden claiming event going 1 1/16 miles on the all-weather surface. Trevor R. James owns the 4-year-old filly, whom Subratie claimed May 18 from Saffie Joseph, Jr. for $12,500. Saturday's win was her second start for Subratie.

“I grew up in Jamaica, but I got my license at Calder. I ran a couple races at Calder [in 1997] and went back to Jamaica,” said Subratie. “I said, 'Let me go home and get things going.'

“It's been a long time coming. My owners have been pushing me to come here. I started my career here. I'm going to give it a shot. It's never too late.”

Subratie trains a stable of six at Gulfstream and also had four runners entered at Jamaica's Caymanas Park Saturday.

“I've always looked forward to racing at Gulfstream,” he said. “To get my first winner was: 'Yes!'

“We're trying to build. It's not going to happen overnight. It's coming along nicely, and I'm pleased and happy with the horses I have right now.”

The post After 800 Jamaican Wins, Trainer Gets First U.S. Win appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

He may have taken a right turn out of the starting gate and drifted in the lane, but Mo Plex (c, 3, Complexity–Mo Joy, by Uncle Mo) made a beeline for the finish line in the nine-furlong GIII Ohio Derby, gliding through his first attempt at two turns with efficacy. Chunk of Gold (Preservationist), recently profiled on these pages after his GI Kentucky Derby ninth, was second, while McAfee (Cloud Computing), the GIII Peter Pan Stakes runner-up and half to Horse of the Year Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna), was third.

Entered in the June 4 Mike Lee Stakes going seven furlongs at Saratoga, Mo Plex was forced to scratch when one of trainer Jeremiah Englehart's horses tested positive for strangles and the barn was placed under a two-week quarantine. No horse stabled in the barn was allowed to race or train among other horses at Saratoga, but they were permitted isolated training sessions on the Oklahoma training track following the rest of the horse population's scheduled training hours. While not allowed to race, Mo Plex missed no training time and registered two bullet works on the Oklahoma during the quarantine, including four furlongs in :48 2/5 (1/64) June 13. Englehart reportedly routed Mo Plex to the Ohio Derby as the colt was ready for a race and the timing was right.

Bred in New York by Everything's Cricket Racing, the R and H Stable runner kept pacesetter Clever Again (American Pharoah)–last seen also showing the way in the GI Preakness Stakes after three straight wins to start his career–honest through fractions of :23.42 and :47.75. Despite Mo Plex sitting just off his flank with McAfee threatening to join the fray from third, Clever Again motored on nicely through the first six furlongs with his ears flicking back and forth. Jockey Joseph Ramos and Mo Plex pounced on the turn, looked Clever Again in the eye, and drove clear while drifting in the stretch when Ramos encouraged him with a left-handed stick. Ramos swapped the crop to his right as Mo Plex put an exclamation point on his afternoon, pulling away by two lengths in the final sixteenth as Chunk of Gold chased him home.

A $27,000 RNA at Fasig-Tipton's New York-bred yearling sale in 2023, Mo Plex sold as a 2-year-old in training for $45,000 to JCE Racing at the 2024 OBS Spring sale. Unveiled by Englehart a year and a day before the Ohio Derby in a statebred maiden special weight during Belmont's Aqueduct meet, Mo Plex trounced his foes by 10 lengths, then put together a three-race winning streak which included the GIII Sanford Stakes and Saratoga's statebred Funny Cide Stakes. After closing out his year with placings in the GI Champagne Stakes and Sleepy Hollow Stakes, he revved up again after a 4 1/2-month freshening with another placing in the Gander Stakes. He was last seen winning the Apr. 18 Bay Shore Stakes at Aqueduct, where he notched the highest Beyer Speed Figure–an 88–of his career. Although never off the board, until Saturday all of Mo Plex's career wins had been at seven furlongs or less, while he had not won in his previous three attempts at a mile. His final time for the 1 1/8 miles of the Ohio Derby was 1:50.72.

Pedigree Notes:

One of two graded/group winners by young Airdrie stallion Complexity, Mo Plex also is one of seven black-type winners for his second-crop sire. Winner of the 2018 GI Champagne Stakes, Complexity closed out 2024 among North America's top five leading freshman sires by earnings, while finishing in a tie for the most black-type winners and the most graded winners. He remains among the top five of his crop for 2025 as well, with four stakes winners on the year and an initial 2-year-old winner from his second crop already in the books.

Mo Plex is the first foal for his unraced dam, Mo Joy, a granddaughter of 1997 GIII Florida Oaks winner and GI Ashland Stakes runner-up Anklet. Like herself, Mo Joy's own dam was unraced. A daughter of the late Uncle Mo, whose 25 stakes winners out of his daughters include 2025 luminaries Thorpedo Anna, Journalism, and Nitrogen, Mo Joy has a 2-year-old colt by Maximus Mischief, a yearling colt by Improbable, and a Mar. 27-foaled colt by Independence Hall.

 

O-R and H Stable; B-Everything's Cricket Racing (NY); T-Jeremiah C. Englehart.

#10 MO PLEX ($12.80) got the lead coming to the stretch and pulled away to win the $500,000 Ohio Derby (G3) at Thistledown. @JockeyJoeRamos was up for trainer @jceracingstable and owner R and H Stable. Congrats to all the connections! pic.twitter.com/J58LqXAdaE

— FanDuel Racing (@FanDuel_Racing) June 21, 2025

Saturday, Thistledown
OHIO DERBY-GIII, $500,000, Thistledown, 6-21, 3yo, 1 1/8m, 1:50.72, ft.
1–MO PLEX, 126, c, 3, by Complexity
            1st Dam: Mo Joy, by Uncle Mo
            2nd Dam: Gold Anklet, by Lemon Drop Kid
            3rd Dam: Anklet, by Wild Again
($27,000 RNA Ylg '23 SARAUG; $45,000 2yo '24 OBSAPR).
O-R and H Stable; B-Everythings Cricket Racing (NY);
T-Jeremiah C. Englehart; J-Joseph D. Ramos. $300,000.
Lifetime Record: GISP, 8-5-1-2, $745,000. Werk Nick Rating: A++.
Click for the eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.
Click for the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree.
2–Chunk of Gold, 126, c, 3, Preservationist–Play for Gold,
by Cairo Prince. ($2,500 Ylg '23 FTKOCT). O-Terry L. Stephens;
B-Brereton C. Jones (KY); T-Ethan W. West. $100,000.
3–McAfee, 126, c, 3, Cloud Computing–Sataves, by Uncle Mo.
($40,000 Ylg '23 KEESEP). O-Black Type Thoroughbreds,
Swinbank Stables LLC, Judy B. Hicks and Scott C. Rice; B-Judy
Hicks (KY); T-Richard E. Dutrow, Jr. $50,000.
Margins: 2, 2, 4 3/4. Odds: 5.40, 1.20, 3.10.
Also Ran: Extradition, Brereton's Baytown, Clever Again, Bohemian Style, Capo Luca. Scratched: Curvino, Master Controller. Click for the Equibase.com chart and the TJCIS.com PPs. VIDEO, sponsored by FanDuel TV.

The post Mo Plex Aces Two-Turn Test in Ohio Derby appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Friend Ofthe Devil heads to victory in Saturday’s Spectacular Bid division of the New York Stallion Stakes Series. Susie Raisher/NYRA photo

By Alec DiConza

It’s safe to say that the beginning of Friend Ofthe Devil’s career did not go as planned. The son of Honest Mischief finished eighth and ninth in his first two starts, on the dirt at Saratoga Race Course last summer.

Trainer Carlos Martin then made a switch to grass for Friend Ofthe Devil’s next race and was rewarded when the colt owned by Marc Holliday’s Blue Devil Racing Stable and Jerold Zaro won for fun by 6 1/4 lengths.

In the eight months since that maiden score, Friend Ofthe Devil has risen to the top of the New York-bred 3-year-old turf sprint division. He won his first stakes when dominating Saturday’s $145,500 Spectacular Bid division of the New York Stallion Stakes Series, a 6-furlong sprint for 3-year-old New York-breds on the outer turf at Aqueduct.

“He’s just a horse that always showed a lot of ability,” Martin said. “We were very disappointed in his first two races and things didn’t go right. It’s funny, Irad Ortiz said ‘Maybe he’ll be a turf horse,’ because he was disappointed after he rode him the second time. I talked to Marc (Holliday) after the race and said, ‘Irad said we have a turf horse here.’ I’m glad we got him on the turf.”

Friend Ofthe Devil contested the Spectacular Bid as the 1-5 favorite off a 6-furlong allowance win in April. Stablemate Dancing Bear broke quicker out of the gate, but that didn’t matter when Friend Ofthe Devil coasted to the lead on the inside and sprinted through a quarter-mile in :21.98 with a 1 1/2-length lead. The colt maintained that margin through the turn, and after a half-mile in :43.92 he spurted to an even bigger lead under Christopher Elliott and crossed the wire 4 lengths in front of runner-up River Of Time. I’m Due finished third, followed by Dancing Bear. Friend Ofthe Devil finished in 1:07.41, less than a second off the track record.

“Leaving there, he did hit the gate. He broke out a little bit, but after that he relaxed nice and was doing it easy,” Elliott said. “He’s a very classy horse. He’s a horse you can’t really take too much of a hold of because he’ll lug out. You have to let him do his thing, but he’s a talented young horse and I’m excited that I had the opportunity to ride him.”

Holliday said he was “thrilled” with his colt’s performance and praised the New York Racing Association for its New York-bred stakes program.

“NYRA has spent so much time and effort to support this program,” he said. “We want to have the best races, and we also want to have our New York-bred and New York-sired horses well represented. Honest Mischief has been a really honest sire, and he has some very nice horses out there. Friend Ofthe Devil is one of them. It’s a little extra satisfaction when you get into the winner’s circle with a horse like that.”

After three 6-furlong victories, Friend Ofthe Devil stretch to a mile for the Cab Calloway division of the New York Stallion Series in his next start.

“He looked great and I’m excited about maybe giving him an opportunity with a little more distance staying in the Stallion Series in the Cab Calloway – he was an old family friend, Cab Calloway,” Martin said of the legendary singer, band leader and racing fan. “Hopefully, if we can get him to cooperate and relax a little, a mile might be within his scope.”

Friend Ofthe Devil was bred by Laurel Least, Farview Farm and Robert Tugel. He sold for $37,000 as a weanling at the Fasig-Tipon fall mixed sale at Saratoga in 2022, and brought $145,000 as a yearling the following August at Saratoga. He is the third foal out of the unraced Bodemeister mare Fabuleux. The other foal to race is two-time winner Janssen, a son of Accelerate and an earner of $94,887.

The post Friend Ofthe Devil speeds to first stakes win in NYSS turf sprint appeared first on New York Thoroughbred Breeders, Inc. News.

GI Kentucky Derby hero Mystik Dan (Goldencents) will square off against old foe, GI Longines Breeders' Cup Classic winner, and 'TDN Rising Star Sierra Leone (Gun Runner), plus G1 Dubai World Cup champ Hit Show (Candy Ride {Arg}) and GISW sprinter and 'TDN Rising Star' Mindframe (Constitution) in next Saturday's 44th running of the $1-million GI Stephen Foster Stakes at Churchill Downs, which is a “Win and You're In” qualifier for the Breeders' Cup Classic.

The last time Mystik Dan and Sierra Leone faced one another was in the 2024 Derby, when the former took home the coveted title by a nose over the latter.

Run at nine panels, the Stephen Foster headlines a 12-race program beneath the Twin Spires that also includes the 50th running of the GII Fasig-Tipton Fleur de Lis Stakes, which is a “Win and You're In” race for the GI Longines Breeders' Cup Distaff. Horse of the Year and 'TDN Rising Star Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna) takes on four others.

Supporting stakes on the undercard include the GII Wise Dan Stakes; the GIII Kelly's Landing Stakes; the American Derby Stakes; and the Tepin Stakes.

First post is 12:45 p.m. (all times Eastern) with the Stephen Foster scheduled as the 11th race at 6:03 p.m.

The post Mystik Dan Faces Sierra Leone in Next Saturday’s Stephen Foster, Undercard Includes Thorpedo Anna appeared first on TDN | Thoroughbred Daily News | Horse Racing News, Results and Video | Thoroughbred Breeding and Auctions.

Lazzat gave France its first success of the week at Royal Ascot June 21 after several near-misses with a victory in the six-furlong Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes (G1).

Globetrotting champion Rebel's Romance stepped into the ring and stamped his authority over the Hardwicke Stakes (G2) June 21, by far the most important victory on home soil for the U.K.-trained horse.

A good week for jockey Kieran Shoemark turned into a great one when Noble Champion ran out an impressive 25-1 winner of the Jersey Stakes (G3) at Royal Ascot.

With projected heat indexes in excess of 105 well into the evening, Canterbury Park has canceled the June 21 Northern Stars Turf Festival program that had been scheduled to begin at 5 p.m.

The Foundation for the Horse is awarding its first Equine Care Grants totaling $75,000 to 30 equine adoption, rescue, retirement, and therapy facilities in 18 states and Puerto Rico.

Rebel's Romance is the headliner in the June 21 Hardwicke Stakes (G2) at Royal Ascot.

The first five in the betting for the June 21 Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes (G1) at Royal Ascot feature two horses trained in France and one each in Britain, Japan, and Ireland.

There was no doubting Joe Murphy's popularity after the 70-year-old from Tipperary realized his lifetime ambition thanks to Cercene's tenacious success in the June 20 Coronation Stakes (G1) at Royal Ascot.

Trainer Karl Burke turned around a frustrating week as the highly regarded Venetian Sun burst home to land the June 20 Albany Stakes (G3) at Royal Ascot under Clifford Lee.