Wasted Tears has been training like a mare on a mission. One of the nation’s top turf runners, she has turned in a series of bullet works at her Retama Park base and is scheduled to ship next week to Hollywood Park for the Grade 1, $250,000 Matriarch on Nov. 26. “We’re planning for California,” said Bart Evans, who owns and trains Wasted Tears. “We’d be looking at getting there a week before the race, on the 19th. We might work her a little bit out there, if she so desires. That’s what we did at Del Mar. We blew her out a little bit.” In August, Wasted Tears won the Grade 2 John C. Mabee at Del Mar, shipping in from Retama. The win was her fifth from six starts this year, with her lone loss in 2010 coming in last month’s Grade 1 First Lady at Keeneland. She finished fifth, beaten 1 1/4 lengths, in the race run Oct. 9. Wasted Tears was freshened following the First Lady, and last week she worked a half-mile in a bullet 47.40 seconds at Retama, near San Antonio. She was scheduled to work there again Thursday. “She feels good, is doing things good,” Evans said. Evans said Wasted Tears would follow the same traveling pattern she used for her last trip to Southern California. She will have two overnight stops while vanning west, one at Evans’s farm in Midland, Texas, and the other in Tucson, Ariz. A decision on a rider for the Matriarch has not been made, Evans said. Wasted Tears has won five graded stakes and $720,598. She is a 5-year-old by Najran. Richey on a roll at Delta Trainer Tony Richey is having a career year, with 81 wins and $1.5 million in stable earnings so far in 2010, and success at Delta Downs in Vinton, La., is helping drive the numbers. He is tied for leading trainer at the current meet and was on fire here this past spring, when he won with 33 percent of his starters. “I don’t think we’ll ever tie that meet,” Richey said of the fall-spring season in 2009-2010. “At one point, we won 12 in row. It was crazy.” Richey won 44 races overall last season at Delta, for stable earnings of $781,370. He is back again this meet with 40 horses and is fresh off winning the title at Louisiana Downs. And the Richey barn is growing as he plans to send 10 horses into Fair Grounds. “We usually keep around 30 horses, and now we’ve got close to 45 we keep in training,” he said. Richey had been a private trainer for Oak Leaf Stable, but the barn is now a public racing stable and Oak Leaf remains a strong client. The numbers have grown because of the status change and because Richey has been claiming more horses than usual for clients. Among his success stories are Louisiana-bred stakes winners Debris, Productive Envoy and Wholelotaking. “We’ve not really been known to claim, but the last couple of years we’ve started because the purses are so good,” Richey said. “It’s a quick turnaround, and the owners like a quick turnaround on their money now. We’ve been fortunate things have worked out well.” Richey is 5 for 19 at the current Delta meet, sharing the lead in the standings with Sam Breaux. All American champ retired Runnning Brook Gal, who won the Grade 1 All American Futurity for Quarter Horses in 2009 to be named champion 2-year-old, has been retired, trainer Paul Jones said. “She’s going to go to the broodmare shed,” he said Monday. Runnning Brook Gal is currently at Los Alamitos, and Jones said in time she will be based at the Utah farm of her owners, A&C Racing. She won 5 of 13 starts and $1,359,989. “She’s a great horse, was a really good 2-year-old,” Jones said. “She qualified for the Ruidoso Futurity, the Rainbow Futurity, won the All American Futurity, qualified for the [Hobbs America] Futurity at Zia, then won the Southwest Juvenile Championship.” Runnning Brook Gal is a 3-year-old by Brookstone Bay. Pursue a Dream tops starter race Pursue a Dream, who won the $125,000 DeBartolo Memorial at Remington Park in September, heads a $20,000 starter allowance at the track Friday night. To be run over 1 3/8 miles on the grass, the race also drew recent Oklahoma Classics Night Turf winner Strategic Leader. Pursue a Dream has compiled a 5-for-9 record over the Remington turf course. Bobby Walker Jr. has the mount for trainer Mike Biehler. Strategic Leader has won 9 of 20 starts over Remington’s turf course. Benny Landeros will ride for trainer Roger Engel. ◗ Lone Star Park closes out its Quarter Horse meet Saturday night with the richest race in Texas, the $1,036,612 Texas Classic Futurity. The 400-yard race will share a program with the Grade 1, $367,649 Texas Classic Derby for Quarter Horses. The races were drawn Wednesday. ◗ Sweet Ducky, a multiple stakes winner from Monmouth Park, arrived at Delta Downs on Wednesday to begin preparations for the Grade 3, $1 million Delta Jackpot on Nov. 20. Also making the trip was his stablemate Nacho Friend.