Flores to Enter Facility for Drug Rehabilitation

David Flores, a jockey with a poor attendance record at California tracks this year, has entered a drug rehabilitation facility, his agent, Don Pierce, said Friday.

Flores didn’t show up to ride on Thursday at Santa Anita after winning one race there on Tuesday, which was opening day. Pierce said that he had a long talk with Flores on Thursday and the 27-year-old jockey acknowledged that he had a problem. Pierce said that Flores will be away for three or four weeks.

Since arriving on the Southern California circuit from his native Tijuana in 1989, Flores has won big races and won in clusters, but in mid-September he surprised stewards during the Los Angeles County Fair meet at Fairplex Park when he missed two consecutive days of riding.

Flores had led the Fairplex meet six years in a row, setting a record with 48 winners in 1991, and had ridden nine winners at the Pomona track through the first four days of this year’s meet. The stewards suspended Flores indefinitely, and he didn’t ride at Fairplex the rest of the season.

Returning after paying a $1,000 fine, Flores won eight races at the Oak Tree meeting at Santa Anita and was aboard 10 winners at the recently completed Hollywood Park meet, but he didn’t ride regularly at either track.

Flores got the biggest victory of his career in 1991 on Marquetry in the $1-million Hollywood Gold Cup. Flores broke Marquetry on top, and they held off favored Farma Way by a head at the wire. Marquetry paid $56.80, the biggest win price in the history of the race. One of the reasons that trainer Bobby Frankel gave Flores the mount on Marquetry was that he was able to make the 110 pounds, which gave them a 12-pound advantage over Farma Way.

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Santa Anita ran the first grass races of the meeting Friday, and Goncalino Almeida was aboard a stakes winner again when he rode Windsharp to a nine-length win in the $70,000 Reloy.

Almeida won the $106,600 California Breeders’ Champion Stakes with Ready To Order on Thursday.

Windsharp, owned by Richard Stephen and trained by Wally Dollase, was making her third start in the United States after arriving from France. After a second-place finish behind Yenda in the Long Island Handicap, the 4-year-old filly finished in a dead heat for fourth in Hollywood Park’s $700,000 Matriarch. The winner, Duda, beat her by only 1 1/4 lengths.

In Europe, Windsharp won five of 13 starts. She paid $4.20 Friday after running 1 1/4 miles in 2:02 1/5.

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Horse Racing Notes

Luthier Fever--also nominated for a grass race, Monday’s $125,000 San Gabriel Handicap--has been entered for Sunday’s $70,000 Ack Ack Stakes, at one mile on dirt. Winner of the California Cup Classic, beating Best Pal, Luthier Fever missed a rematch when they were both scratched from Hollywood Park’s Native Diver Handicap because of a sloppy track. . . . Others running in the Ack Ack are Uncaged Fury, Kingdom Found, Dramatic Gold, Bai Brun, Pollock’s Luck, Savinio and Constant Craving. . . . A busy 2-year-old, Wheatly Special, heads the 10-horse field in Sunday’s $100,000 filly division of the California Breeders’ Champion Stakes. Wheatly Special, after winning as a maiden at a $32,000 claiming price, won the California Cup Juvenile Fillies and will be making her sixth start in less than three months.