Fiery Hall of Fame jockey dies at age 80

Manny Ycaza, a Hall of Fame jockey who won the 1964 Belmont Stakes and paved the way for generations of Latin Americans to ride in North America, has died. He was 80.

Ycaza died Monday of pneumonia and sepsis at a hospital in Forest Hills, New York, according to his wife, Jeanne De Ycaza. She said he had been admitted a day earlier after the couple had gone for a walk.

He won 2,367 races from 10,561 mounts and rode such acclaimed thoroughbreds as Ack Ack, Damascus, Dr. Fager and Sword Dancer.

He was aboard Quadrangle in the 1964 Belmont, spoiling Northern Dancer’s Triple Crown bid. It was Ycaza’s lone victory in a Triple Crown race.

He finished second on Ridan in the 1962 Preakness.

A famous photo shows Ycaza sparring with jockey John Rotz on eventual winner Greek Money in the stretch run of the race. Ycaza was second aboard Never Bend in the 1963 Kentucky Derby.

Ycaza rode most of his career on the East Coast, winning four riding titles at Saratoga in upstate New York.

He was a four-time winner of the Kentucky Oaks for fillies and the first back-to-back winner of the Washington D.C. International in 1959-60.

He became the first Latino rider inducted into the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1977.

Three cubs found abandoned in a washroom along the TransCanada Highway in Banff National Park have been returned to the wild.

The black bears, now yearlings, were found in April 2017 and sent to the Aspen Valley Wildlife Sanctuary in Ontario.

Officials with Parks Canada said the three sisters were released in the Banff backcountry on Tuesday.

“The bears were in excellent condition,” Bill Hunt, manager of resource conservation with Banff National Park, said at a Wednesday news conference.

Each bear has grown to about 50 kilograms from the three kilograms they weighed when they first went to the wildlife sanctuary.

Officials there said the cubs were initially fed formula with a bottle before contact with humans was limited.

“One of the most important aspects was to try to maintain minimal contact to allow for a successful transition back in the wild,” said Howard Smith, the sanctuary’s managing director. “We cared for them initially as they were very young.

“Once they transitioned to a more solid food, we moved them into larger accommodations.”

It curves elegantly, its delicate bones looking as if they could easily slither out of the amber encasing them into the forest undergrowth that would have been home.

The oldest fossil of a baby snake ever found leaves University of Alberta paleontologist Tiago Rodrigues Simoes in awe.

“It’s like magic,” he said. Simoes, with fellow paleontologist Mike Caldwell, describes their 100-million-year baby in an article published in the journal Science Advances on Wednesday.

The snake skeleton, less than five centimetres long, is almost complete except for the skull. Entombed in a chunk of amber about the size of an adult thumb, it includes 97 tiny vertebrae, most with their feathery ribs still attached.

They were kept in a larger enclosure at the facility in the Muskoka area, he said.

Parks Canada said that one of its wildlife workers flew out to Ontario earlier this week to pick up the bears.

The animals were transported in three separate crates by vehicle to Toronto before being flown early Tuesday morning to Calgary, where they hit the road for the Rocky Mountains in a horse trailer.

The bears were then slung in a crate under a helicopter into an unidentified location in the Banff backcountry.

“As soon as the doors opened, the bears stepped out, had a look around and actually began foraging on some nearby vegetation,” said Hunt. “They looked happy and healthy in their new environment.”

It’s still unknown how the bears ended up in the roadside bathroom last year.

“We certainly believe they had some help from a person or persons,” said Hunt. “We would really encourage anyone who knows anything more about that to please contact us. We would like to resolve that.”

The bears were sent to Ontario because no Alberta facilities were permitted to take them at the time. The province lifted the ban on private rehabilitation of orphaned cubs in April.