Amid investigation, Quiroz will stop training at Fair Hill

Angel Quiroz, the trainer involved with eight horses who may have been involved in an international wagering coup as well as a ninth horse who tested positive for albuterol while training at the same time and location as the coup d'octet, will leave Fair Hill Training Center within a month.

Will Phipps, executive director for Fair Hill in Elkton, Md., said that Quiroz's lease expires in a couple of weeks, but the conditioner may leave sooner.

"He's working through the logistics now," Phipps said on Friday morning. "He has been asked to leave and is agreeable; he's peacefully moving on."

Horse Racing Nation also contacted Quiroz on Friday morning, and the trainer would not say what his plans are for training once he leaves Fair Hill.

"My job is to get horses ready to win races," Quiroz said. "I have done nothing illegal. Let (the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority) handle the investigation. The industry pays them $77 million to do this kind of work."

On Aug. 9, Quiroz won a pair of races at Monmouth Park while two other horses he trained before selling to trainer Ernesto Ochoa won at Saratoga. That same day, a fifth horse he trained finished fourth at Saratoga and a sixth horse he had trained before selling to Monica McGoey finished second at Colonial Downs. On Aug. 10, two other horses associated with Quiroz's Fair Hill barn were scratched from races at Presque Isle Downs and Mountaineer, the former by HISA as unfit to race and the latter by new trainer Alexis Cordero-Lopez.

All nine of the horses in question trained with Quiroz at Fair Hill. The horse Cordero-Lopez scratched at Mountaineer, Bravo Rough, is a full brother to Bonita Rough, the horse the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit says tested positive for albuterol. Quiroz was Bravo Rough's trainer of record as of his last start Feb. 27 at Gulfstream. That day he raced under the silks of breeder Long Trail Stables, the same owner of record as Bonita Rough in her lone career start June 22 at Gulfstream.