DIAMOND OOPS, PAYNTDEMBLUESAWAY HEAD SATURDAY TURF STAKES
The track’s finest grass speedsters of both sexes swing into action Saturday, with a pair of $100,000, 5-furlong races highlighting a 10-race “Turf Sprint Showcase Day” card. First post time is 12:13 p.m.
The Turf Dash Stakes, for horses 4-years-old-and-upward, will be run as the 10th race. It has attracted a field of 11 males headed by 7-year-old gelding Diamond Oops, a multiple graded-stakes winner with career earnings of $1,364,483.
Diamond Oops, who is owned by Diamond 100 Racing Club, Amy E. Dunne, D P Racing and Patrick L. Biancone Racing and trained by Biancone, will break from the No. 4 post under jockey Romero Ramsay Maragh.
The afternoon’s other stakes is the Lightning City Stakes for fillies and mares 4-and-upward, which will be contested as the eighth race. Heading the 12-horse field (plus two alternates) is Payntdembluesaway, a 6-year-old mare who won the Claiming Crown Distaff Dash Starter Stakes on Dec. 4 at Gulfstream Park in gate-to-wire fashion at the 5-furlong distance on the turf.
Owned by All My Hart Racing and trained by Jane Cibelli, Payntdembluesaway, who is 8-for-14 lifetime, will be ridden by Pablo Morales. Payntedembluesaway will break from the No. 10 post.
The Lightning City field also includes 4-year-old filly Mamba Wamba, who is trained by Brian Lynch and will be ridden by Julien Leparoux.
The purse money for both races includes $25,000 in Florida Thoroughbred Breeders’ and Owners’ Association stakes funds for registered Florida-breds among the top six finishers.
Around the oval. Thoroughbred racing continues Friday with a nine-race card beginning at 12:15 p.m. Tampa Bay Downs races on a Wednesday-Friday-Saturday-Sunday schedule, with the exception of Easter Sunday, April 17, when the track is closed.
Otherwise, the Oldsmar oval is open every day for simulcast wagering, no-limits poker action and tournament play in The Silks Poker Room and golf fun and instruction at The Downs Golf Practice Facility.