2025.11.06 Oaklawn Racing Updates

Racing Updates
Compiled by Robert Yates

Thursday, Nov. 6, 2025

Trainer Nancy Knott’s one-horse stable has returned to Oaklawn, with the goal of another dream season in 2025-2026.

Knott’s lone runner, Arkansas-bred star Navy Seal, won three races at the 2024-2025 Oaklawn meeting, including the $150,000 Nodouble Stakes for state-bred sprinters. The Nodouble was the first career stakes victory for Navy Seal, a 7-year-old Midshipman gelding, and Knott, the wife of Oaklawn starter William “Blue” Knott.

Navy Seal, if all goes well, will make his comeback in a state-bred allowance sprint Dec. 20.

“I’m shooting for that one,” Nancy Knott said Wednesday morning. “Hopefully, it will go, then get him to the Nodouble. That’s always a goal, the Nodouble.”

The six-furlong $150,000 Nodouble is Feb. 21.

Navy Seal punctuated his 2024-2025 Oaklawn campaign with a victory against open allowance company in April. Navy Seal ran three more times after the Oaklawn meeting ended, finishing second in the $50,000 Work All Week Handicap May 25 at Hawthorne, third in the $100,000 Iowa Sprint Stakes July 4 at Prairie Meadows and second in an Aug. 24 allowance sprint at Hawthorne.

Navy Seal was then turned out for seven weeks at a suburban Chicago farm, Knott said.

“That was always the plan,” Knott said. “I don’t like to turn them out in the heat of the summer, with the flies. I kind of wait until the fall. He got to eat grass and relax for a few weeks.”

Navy Seal returned to the work tab Sunday at Hawthorne (three furlongs in :39) before shipping Monday to Oaklawn, said Knott, who is regularly aboard for the gelding’s gallops and breezes.

In addition to the Nodouble and allowance victory, Navy Seal captured a state-bred starter sprint early last season at Oaklawn. The gelding finished the meeting with a 3-1-1 mark in five starts and bankrolled $251,600. Navy Seal ($649,054 overall) is among the richest Arkansas-breds in history. He hasn’t finished worse than third in his last 11 starts.

“We’re just going to keep going, as long as he’s up for it,” Knott said.

Knott trains Navy Seal for a Chicago-area partnership that includes David Fishbein.

Finish Lines

Entries will be accepted and post positions drawn Dec. 5 for Oaklawn’s Dec. 12 opening-day card. The 64-day split season concludes May 2. … Trainer Steve Hobby of Hot Springs said Wednesday morning that he doesn’t believe he’ll have a starter in 2025-2026 at Oaklawn. Hobby began a training sabbatical after the 2024-2025 Oaklawn meeting ended last May. “Enjoying it,” Hobby, 69, said. Hobby (314 victories, including four last season) is the 16th-winningest trainer in Oaklawn history. … Oaklawn-raced Lagynos and Tapit Shoes are entered in the G3-$300,000 River City Stakes for 3-year-olds and up at 1 1/8 miles on the turf Saturday at Churchill Downs. … Oaklawn-raced Amber Cascade is entered in the $250,000 G3-Long Island Stakes for fillies and mares at 1 3/8 miles on the turf Saturday at Aqueduct. … Oaklawn-raced Marmalade Skye and Mink’s Palace are entered in the six-furlong $300,000 Dream Supreme Stakes for fillies and mares Saturday at Churchill Downs. … Oaklawn stakes winner Wild Bout Hilary is the 5-2 program favorite for the $100,000 Treasure Chest Stakes Saturday at Delta Downs. … Oaklawn-raced Blue Devil and The Donegal Clan are entered in Delta Downs’ $100,000 Delta Mile Stakes Saturday. … Oaklawn stakes winner Bishops Bay is entered in Keeneland’s Horses of Racing Age Sale Nov. 12.