Labor Day Racing in North America

Final day of racing for the year at Ellis Park, River Downs, Canterbury Park, Timonium, Fairmount Park, Sacramento, Ruidoso, and of course, Saratoga.

Highlight of the day will be the 104th renewal of the Hopeful at Saratoga featuring Coolmore's Munnings, Darley's Desert Party and the New York bred wonder Cribnote.

There is plenty of good stakes action from 50k to 200k including multiple stakes cards at Canterbury, Del Mar, Finger Lakes, Monmouth, Mountaineer, Pinnacle, Presque Isle, Remington, and Woodbine.

The best card of the day may be at Philadelphia Park where they are offering their first slots-enhanced Pennsylvania Derby- the 29th running - with a million dollar purse that drew a full field of 14. 5k & 7.5k claimers running for purses of 16k at the track - how can a non-slots state like Maryland possibly compete?

A few other items on today's racing:

Females may take all three stakes today at Remington - even though only one is carded exclusively for them. The 2 year old filly Seacrettina will go postward favorite for the Clever Trevor and the Pin Oak 5 year old mare Brownie Points will likely be the same in the DeBartolo Handicap.

The 6 year old gelding Joey P tries for his 13th win on the Jersey Shore in Icecapade (9th) at Monmouth.

Just Like Biscuit is in the Cradle Stakes at River Downs today - this 2 year old has already run 8 times already - probably the most of any 2 year old in North America. No runner in the Del Mar Debutante has run more than 4 times. There is no indication that running 2 year olds this often causes detriment to their future career - regardless of what some commentators have written about lately.

Arlington Park runs their full 10 race card on the turf today in an event called the Turf Showcase.

My local track - Canterbury - has a cracker card featuring the locally owned Grade II Cornhusker winner Wayzata Bay returning on closing day for the second consecutive year and a meeting of the two best local 2 year olds - Minnetonka Mist and Win Willy - in the 4th race.