Etc. . . .

Suffolk Downs has received approval from the Massachusetts Racing Commission to offer the Kentucky Derby Future Wager. Bets can be made on 23 individual horses or on a mutuel field in each of three separate rounds: Feb. 14-17, March 14 - 17, and April 4-7. . . . The National Thoroughbred Racing Association has finalized the purchase of EquiSource, a group purchasing company started in 1997 by Churchill Downs and UniSource. In conjunction with the purchase, the NTRA has formed a new subsidiary, NTRA Purchasing, which will offer NTRA members savings on products and services from NTRA sponsors. . . . The stretch duel between Sakhee and eventual winner Tiznow in the Breeders' Cup Classic was voted the 2001 NTRA Moment of the Year in a poll of fans conducted on the NTRA website. Second in the voting was Point Given's victory in the Belmont Stakes. . . . Arlington's 107-day 2002 meet, from June 5 to Oct. 27 will have cards Wednesday through Sunday, with Mondays and Tuesdays dark except for Labor Day and Columbus Day. Post time will be 1 p.m., with a 4 p.m. start for "Party in the Park" Fridays through the end of September, and the Fourth of July. . . . Chief Three Sox, a five-time stakes winner whose biggest career victory came in the $100,000 Texas Horse Racing Hall of Fame Stakes at Retama Park near San Antonio in 2000, has been retired and will stand at Stoneview Farm in Hempstead, Texas. Chief Three Sox, a 7-year-old son of Chief Honcho, earned $353,620. . . . Handle on Quarter Horse races increased 11 percent last year over 2000, to $317 million, the American Quarter Horse Association announced Wednesday. A record $73 in purses million was distributed, up 9 percent from the $67 million paid out in 2000. . . . John Russo, longtime counsel for the New York Racing Association, no longer works for NYRA, Barry Schwartz, the association's chairman, confirmed on Wednesday. Schwartz would not comment on the reasons for the departure of Russo.