Thoroughbred racing’s all-time winningest jockey Russell Baze, and three of his colleagues, will fly up from Northern California to take on four of the top riders at Portland Meadows, on Jan. 7th in the first Golden Gate versus Portland Meadows Jockey Challenge, sponsored by XpressBet.

The competition at the Portland, Ore., racetrack will consist of four XpressBet Jockey Challenge races and $20,000 in prize money.

Headlining the event will be the return of Northwest United States native Russell Baze, who has more than 10,200 wins in his career and is once again leading the Golden Gate rider standings. Baze’s son-in-law, Kyle Kaenel, currently fourth in the Golden Gate rider standings, will be part of Team Golden Gate along with Francisco Duran and Leslie Mawing, who each had 28 wins at the Golden Gate meet through Dec. 29th.

Team Portland Meadows will feature the top four riders in the current standings. Debbie Hoonan-Trujillo has been atop the Portland Meadows win list for most of the season, and currently has 45 winds at the meet. Mark Anderson is currently second in the standings in his first season at Portland Meadows. The third member of Team Portland Meadows was to be perennial leading rider Joe Crispin, but he was injured after being thrown from his mount in the third race on Monday at Portland Meadows. His replacement is not known at this time. Crispin, who ranks third at the Portland Racetrack has 35 wins, is expected to miss six to eight weeks. Javier Matias completes the line-up for Team Portland Meadows with his 29 wins, which puts him fourth in the standings.

The competition will feature four XpressBet Jockey Challenge races, each of which will have eight horses in the field. Each of the eight riders will be assigned a mount via random draw. The riders will receive a score based on where their mount finishes.

Points will be given according to the finish of each race; first is worth one point, second two points, and eight eight points, for example. The team with the lowest score at the end of the competition will be the winning team.

The winning team will split up to $10,000, while the losing team will get $5,000. As a bonus, the rider with the most wins will receive $2,500, the second-place rider $1,500, and the third-place rider $1,000. Should there be a tie for most victories, the tiebreaker will be second-place finishes, followed by third-place finishes if needed.

Live coverage of the XpressBet Jockey Challenge will be shown on HRTV with host Jon White and three-time Kentucky Derby winner and Hall of Fame jockey Gary Stevens. The Challenge will be featured in races four through seven, with a start time of about 2:15 p.m. PST.

Is this a new rule to the books? This past meet at Keeneland, riders were given a choice of new whips to use.  Some called them ” fly-swatters,” and some called them many other names. Just to let you know what is next on the horizon, the land down under is taking a closer look at the whip.

Jockeys  may not be permitted to use the whip in two-year-old races if the Australian Racing Board’s draft measures for whip changes are accepted by industry groups.

The board yesterday announced a range of draft measures for changes to the make-up of whips and how they are used. These measures, which also include references to how high a jockey may lift his arm, are to be discussed and either accepted or rejected by sections of the racing industry including major clubs, various state and federal jockey and trainers’ associations, veterinarians and owners’ groups.

Mooted changes include the possibility that whips could be subject to a ban for juvenile horses where jockeys would carry whips but only use them for safety reasons.

The draft measures also include banning the traditional whip in favor of a padded whip, and new specific rules for whip use.

After the consultation period with the industry is finished by the end of January, the board will present a report to racing authorities by February for consideration.

Other draft measures limit the rider’s arm above shoulder height, and ban whip use on a horse that is clearly winning or a horse that has no prospect of improving its placing. Also, restrictions on the amount of in-running whip use and a tougher stance on excessive or unnecessary whip use were put forward.

The Sha Tin Racecourse in Hong Kong was alive with anticipation and excitement on Sunday, 14 December 2008, as everyone got ready for the Cathay Pacific Hong Kong International Races. The day consisted of a number of racing events with very big purses and some of the best horses in the horse racing industry were entered into the respective events. The main racing event was the two thousand meter Hong Kong Cup, and most of the locals had their hopes pinned onto Viva Pataca, but is was a trainer from South Africa, Mike de Kock, and his horse, Eagle Mountain, that caused the great upset of the day.

While watching simulcasting, in a span of a half-hour today, I have seen a horse break down on Hollywood Park’s Cushion Track and another one over Golden Gate Fields’ Tapeta surface. Last night a horse suffered what appeared to be a bad leg fracture, and fell while in a clear lead racing over Turfway’s Polytrack.

In no way am I saying the synthetic surfaces caused these horses’ injuries. But if they had come over dirt tracks, I feel pretty confident many people would want to point a finger at the surface.

When an injury occurs on dirt, the outcry is “the track is breaking down horses.” When it’s on a synthetic surface, it changes to “those things just happen.”

These things are too complicated to readily assign blame to one factor. But it seems to me the jury is still out on whether synthetic surfaces greatly reduce catastrophic injuries in horses over the long run.

It’s interesting that NYRA chief Charlie Hayward says he believes breakdown statistics per starter are misleading and New York will stick with dirt surfaces.

Still, I don’t know many trainers who wouldn’t love to have the option of training over a synthetic surface, especially in bad weather.

With a purse of $250 000, the Grade 1 Hollywood Turf Cup attracts a number of well known racehorses each year. It is a horse racing event for three year old horses and older. In 1991, the first and only filly to ever win the Hollywood Turf Cup, Miss Alleged, crossed the finished line. The legendary horse racing phenomenon, John Henry, also found victory in this event in 1983. On Saturday, 6 December 2008, it was time for Champs Elysees to be crowned victorious at Hollywood Park Racecourse.