Etc...

Spring Meadow ($5.40), trained by Bob Hess Jr., prepped for a possible start in the $100,000 Light Hearted Stakes on July 20 by scoring a three-quarter-length victory over Bruanna in Monday's $58,900 Local Thriller Stakes for filly and mare sprinters at Delaware Park. . . . Prairie Meadows ended its 52-day Thoroughbred meeting Saturday with across-the-board declines in handle from 2002's 53-day meeting. All-sources average daily handle declined 15 percent, to $660,741 this year, down from $774,863 last year, and ontrack handle averaged $73,000 per day, down 11 percent from 2002. . . . William Pascoe III, former president of the California Thoroughbred Breeders Association and owner of Los Cerritos Farm in Murrieta, Calif., died at his California home last week at age 87. Pascoe was also a former chairman of Bay Meadows Operating Company and a director of the Oak Tree Racing Association. . . . The New York State Racing and Wagering Board had not ruled by Monday afternoon on a request from the New York Racing Association to lower the takeout on some of its wagers. NYRA had made the request last Wednesday, but the board postponed the decision in order to study the impact of the reduction. . . . A sold-out crowd of more than 10,000 attended the opening day of Maronas National Racetrack, a 157-acre facility in the coastal city of Montevideo, Uruguay. Lone Star Park, near Dallas, serves as an advisor to the operators of the track, which had been shuttered since Dec. 14, 1997.