SANTA ANITA LEADERS

(Through Wednesday)

Jockeys / Wins

Flavien Prat / 7

Juan Hernandez / 6

Umberto Rispoli / 5

Antonio Fresu / 3

Tiago Pereira / 3

Frankie Dettori / 3

Kazushi Kimura / 3

Trainers / Wins

Phil D’Amato / 5

Mike Puype / 3

Mark Glatt / 3

Bob Baffert / 3

Steve Knapp / 3

Jeff Mullins / 3

UPCOMING STAKES

SANTA ANITA

Saturday

• $200,000, Grade II San Vicente Stakes, 3-year-olds, 7 furlongs

• $100,000, Grade III Las Flores Stakes, fillies and mares, 4-year-olds and up, 6 furlongs

Sunday

• $100,000, Grade III Santa Ynez Stakes, 3-year-old fillies, 7 furlongs

LOS ALAMITOS

Sunday

• $100,000, Grade I Charger Bar Handicap, quarter-horse fillies and mares, 4 and up, 400 yards

• $20,000 Dashingly Handicap, quarter-horse fillies and mares, 4 and up, 350 yards

DOWN THE STRETCH

• The western path to the May 3 Kentucky Derby starts at Santa Anita on Saturday with five horses, four of them unbeaten, contesting the 7-furlong San Vicente Stakes. Bullard (Umberto Rispoli riding), 2 for 2 after pulling away in the Bob Hope Stakes at Del Mar for trainer Michael McCarthy, is a 4-5 favorite on the morning line over the Bob Baffert-trained duo of 8-5 Barnes (Juan Hernandez) and 5-1 Romanesque (Mike Smith). The Santa Anita 3-year-old series will see distances increase and Derby qualifying points awarded in the Feb. 1 Robert B. Lewis, March 2 San Felipe and April 5 Santa Anita Derby.

• The Las Flores, Saturday’s other stakes, finds Baffert-trained Pleasant (Hernandez) favored at 3-5 in the mare’s first start since a close third at 14-1 in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint won by Soul of an Angel. Horses coming out of Breeders’ Cup defeats have been high-percentage but not quite profitable bets so far at Santa Anita, three winners from seven starters: Raging Torrent, paying $7.20; Johannes, $2.60, and Motorious, $3.80.

• The two big winners on Santa Anita’s opening day Dec. 26 will now target $1 million races: Raging Torrent, the Malibu Stakes winner, will aim for the Godolphin Mile on the March 30 Dubai World Cup card, trainer Doug O’Neill said. Johannes, the San Gabriel Stakes winner, will point for the Pegasus World Cup Turf Invitational on Jan. 25 at Gulfstream Park in Florida, trainer Tim Yakteen said.

• Horses who ran their previous race at Pleasanton were winless in 27 starts through Wednesday at Santa Anita, which is carding some lower-level races to accommodate Bay Area horses displaced by the closure of Golden Gate Fields and failure of a non-county-fair Pleasanton meet. But two of them have to win Friday, when there’s a pair of races restricted to Northern Californians. Morning-line favorites in the $10,000 starter optional claiming races are Halo Rando (Flavien Prat), trained by Dean Pederson since the retirement of Steve Specht, and Tesoro (Assael Espinoza), trained by O.J. Jauregui.

• Sixty-three horses died at Santa Anita, Del Mar and Los Alamitos from all causes in 2024, including 16 from musculoskeletal injuries in races, according to data on the California Horse Racing Board website. While totals were similar to recent years at Santa Anita and Del Mar, deaths rose sharply at Los Alamitos to 28 in 2024, the most at the Orange County track since 2020. In November, California Horse Racing Board members blasted Los Al for its injury rates, board chairman Greg Ferraro threatening to call a hearing “to shut you down – we can do it” if they don’t improve.