Laurel Park Cancels Live Racing for Jan. 5

A continuation of extreme cold temperatures in the Mid-Atlantic region caused the Maryland Jockey Club to cancel live racing at Laurel Park for Jan. 5.

Forecasts call for a high of 19 degrees Friday with lows in the single digits and winds gusting to 19 mph.

Friday's nine-race card has been moved to Jan. 8, to be run as drawn. The program includes the $100,000 Thirty Eight Go Go Stakes for fillies and mares and the $100,000 Dave's Friend Stakes for 4-year-olds and up. 

M M G Stables' multiple grade 3 winner El Areeb is entered to make his 4-year-old debut in the Dave's Friend with Trevor McCarthy named to ride for the first time in Maryland since being injured in a May 2016 spill at Monmouth Park.

El Areeb is among 11 horses returning from the Dec. 30 race, along with multiple stakes winners Recruiting Ready, unraced since early June, Never Gone South and Afleet Willy; graded-stakes winners Ready for Rye and Favorite Tale; Jacks or Better Farm homebreds Fellowship and multiple graded-stakes winner Awesome Banner, Irish Colonel, Struth, and Schivarelli.

New to the field is Bruce Golden Racing's Great Stuff, who finished fourth in his last start, beaten less than a length in the six-furlong Gravesend Handicap Dec. 23 for trainer David Jacobson.

A field of 13 is set to line up for the Thirty Eight Go Go including newcomers Sky Flower and Street Surrender, not originally entered Dec. 30. Ronald Clark's Sky Flower is coming off a runner-up finish in the Tiffany Lass Stakes Dec. 26 at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots, while West Point Thoroughbreds' Street Surrender is making his first start for trainer Graham Motion after winning four of 10 starts in California last year.

Leading the returning group is James Courtney's 8-year-old homebred Power of Snunner, the 124-pound highweight who owns nine wins and $576,310 in purse earnings and has finished in the top three in 28 of 34 career starts.