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Nominations Released for National Jockey Club Hcp. & Sixty Sails Hcp.

Pletcher Once Again Loaded in Both Races

Nominations for a pair of Grade III handicap races for older horses, the National Jockey Club (NJC) for the boys and the Sixty Sails for the girls, were released on Wednesday. Both races hold a purse of $250,000 and will be run over nine furlongs at Hawthorne Race Course on Saturday, April 22, 2006.

Trainer Todd Pletcher won both races in 2005, capturing the NJC with Pollards Vision and the Sixty Sails with Isola Piu Bella. He has five of the 17 nominees for this year’s edition of the NJC, and three of the 14 for the Sixty Sails.

The Pletcher contingent for the NJC is headlined by Melnyk Racing Stable’s Harlington, the recent winner of the Grade II Gulfstream Park Handicap on March 4, and Donald Zuckerman and Mary Roberta’s West Virginia, who was last seen capturing the Grade III Excelsior Breeders’ Cup Handicap on April 1 at Aqueduct. He has also made Team Valor’s Colita and WinStar Farm’s Venetian Sunset NJC eligible.

The highest earning NJC nominee is Mary and Joseph Grant and Thomas J. Kelly’s 8-year-old gelding Evening Attire, who has banked over $2.5 million in his 49-race career (12 wins).

Other top nominees to the NJC include (with trainer): Tap Day (Mark Hennig), the winner of the Grade II Meadowlands Cup in 2005 for owner Edward Evans; and Three Hour Nap (Hugh Robertson), who captured the 2004 Grade III Arlington Washington Futurity for the Homewrecker Stable and Hugh Robertson.

Pletcher’s top nominee for the Sixty Sails is the English import Charles H. Wacker III’s Oonagh Maccool, the recent winner of the Grade II Rampart Handicap on March 25 at Gulfstream. He also made Paul H. Saylor’s Fleet Indian, a winner of three straight races including the Grade III Next Move at Aqueduct on March 26, and Melnyk Racing Stables Pool Land, who suffered the first loss of her young career when finishing a troubled sixth the Grade II Shirley Jones Handicap on March 18 at Gulfstream, eligible to the Sixty Sails.

Other top Sixty Sails nominees include (with trainer): T N T Stud’s Notre Dame (Bobby Frankel), a Group III winner in her native Brazil before being imported to the U.S. this January; and Jack Smith III’s Culinary (Michael Stidham), the winner of the 2004 Arlington Washington Lassie.

A complete list of the nominations and early past performances (courtesy of Equibase) for both the NJC and Sixty Sails are attached.

Hawthorne’s spring 2006 Thoroughbred meet runs February 24 through May 4 with live racing five days per week: Friday through Tuesday. Post time is 1:10 p.m. Saturday through Tuesday and 3 p.m. on Friday. Hawthorne is dark Wednesdays and Thursdays and Easter Sunday April 16, but full card simulcasting from racetracks across the country is offered every day.

Hawthorne’s summer 2006 Standardbred meet runs May 6 through June 17 with live racing six days per week: Tuesday through Sunday. Post time will be 7:20 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and 6:30 p.m. on Sunday.

Hawthorne’s fall 2006 Thoroughbred meet runs September 15 through December 31 with live racing five days per week: Wednesday through Sunday. Post time will be 1:10 p.m.

For more information visit www.hawthorneracecourse.com.

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