Midlantic racing wrap: Sept. 7-10
From around the mid-Atlantic…
- Divine Miss Grey won the Dr. James Penny Memorial Stakes Saturday at Parx Racing. Rains forced the event off the turf, knocked it down from a Grade 3 stake to a (pricey) listed stake, and decimated the field. After four horses scratched, just three were left to contest the race, with Divine Miss Grey, the Danny Gargan trainee, sent off at 1-9. With Junior Alvarado in the irons, the Divine Park filly made all the running en route to a nearly-eight length win in 1:43.49 for 1 1/16 miles on a sloppy, sealed main track.
- Monmouth Park reached a rainy conclusion to its 2018 meeting with jockey Jose Ferrer and trainer Jorge Navarro dominating their respective categories. Ferrer won with 95 of 354 mounts, a gaudy 27 percent strike rate, to finish 24 wins ahead of runner-up Paco Lopez. Meanwhile, Navarro’s 85 wins at the track were — get this — 50 more than any other trainer. Navarro won with 45 percent of his starters, while Jason Servis, in second with 35 wins, won with 41 percent of his. Navarro and Ferrer teamed up to win the meet’s second-to-last race with Sassy Chub.
- Laurel Park kicked off its fall meeting with three cards, two of them taken off the turf. Summer meet-leading jockey Jevian Toledo hit the ground running, winning four times on opening weekend to pace all riders. That included a maiden-breaking score by Abbo on Saturday.
- In a pair of state-bred juvenile maiden events at Charles Town on Saturday, first-time starters Amelia Bedelia and Parisian Diva impressed. The former, trained by Jeff Runco for David Raim and ridden by Arnaldo Bocachica, rallied from fifth to win going away by over a length in 52.95 seconds for 4 1/2 furlongs. The latter, trained by Stacey Viands for owner/breeder Melinda Golden, led every step of the way en route to a 7 1/4-length victory in a zippy 52.46 seconds.
