LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Two horses fell and unseated their riders in the second race at Churchill Downs on Thursday, two days before the historic track hosts the 150th Kentucky Derby.
Ridden by Irving Moncada, Territoriality clipped an outside horse’s hind heels and fell leaving the five-eighths pole, according to the Equibase chart notes. Vostra struck another horse and lost jockey Emmanuel Giles leaving the five-sixteenths pole.
Both loose horses were corralled by outriders and walked back to their barns. Moncada and Giles were transported to local hospitals for further evaluation, Churchill Downs spokesman Darren Rogers said.
The $42,000 claiming race for fillies and mares 3 years old and up was run at 1 1/16 miles on the dirt.
Last spring, 12 horses died at Churchill Downs, including two on Derby day, which led the track to move the rest of its spring meet to western Kentucky. No single cause was found for the spate of deaths, but they prompted the track to make several changes ahead of this year’s Derby, including to its dirt surface.
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