Santa Anita will open its training track to limited activity on Friday, the first time any training has been held since Tuesday.
Santa Anita closed its main track and training track on Tuesday and announced there will be no racing at least through Sunday after the filly Lets Light the Way became the 21st equine fatality since Dec. 26 when she was injured in a workout on the main track. Neither track was open on Wednesday or Thursday.
Thursday, track consultant Dennis Moore and Mick Peterson, the director of the University of Kentucky's Agricultural Equine Program, began an inspection of the main track, the second such undertaking in the last two weeks.
Peterson was part of an inspection on Feb. 25-27 that found no irregularities, track officials and Peterson said at the time. Racing resumed on Feb. 28. Two horses suffered fatal injuries in racing or training on March 2 and on Tuesday.
Moore and Peterson's findings in the ongoing inspection will determine when training and racing can resume at Santa Anita.
Beginning Friday, horses will be allowed to jog or gallop on the infield training track. No horses will be permitted to have workouts. The track will be open from 5 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.
Trainers with 2-year-olds have been instructed to bring those horses to the training track from 10 to 11 a.m. for exercise. Horses can be ponied only after 11 a.m.
Trainers have asked in recent days to be allowed to use the training track. Some trainers are shipping horses to Los Alamitos to work there on the one-mile track in coming days.