Higher Fire by a neck

LOS ALAMITOS, Calif. - Higher Fire beat a field that included All American Futurity winner Teller Cartel in Friday's $1,100,000 Golden State Million Futurity for Quarter Horses at Los Alamitos.

The victory keeps Higher Fire eligible to earn a $1 million bonus for winning the three major futurities at Los Alamitos. The filly won the Ed Burke Memorial Futurity in July. The series continued with the Golden State Million and ends with the Los Alamitos Million Futurity in December.

Ridden by J.R. Ramirez, Higher Fire ($8.40) finished a neck in front of 19-1 Wave Carver. Teller Cartel, the 2-1 favorite, finished third. He led early but finished three-quarters of a length behind Higher Fire, who ran 400 yards in 19.46 seconds.

Higher Fire is trained by Jaime Gomez for Denny Boer and Jim Streelman. Higher Fire has won 5 of 7 starts and $966,673.

Saturday, Catchmeinyourdreams ($3.20) won his second major stakes of the year in the $300,000 MBNA Challenge Championship for older Quarter Horses. Ridden by Cody Jensen, Catchmeinyourdreams was hand-ridden to a one-length win over This Snow Is Cold.

Catchmeinyourdreams is a top contender for Quarter Horse of the Year, a title he could clinch with a win in the Champion of Champions at Los Alamitos in December.

Saturday's Challenge Championship program featured five stakes worth $100,000 or more.

In other stakes, Texas Chatterbox ($35.60) won the Distaff Championship, Canosa ($35) won the Juvenile Championship, LDS Dash for Dylan ($4) won the Derby Challenge, and Prankster CF ($2.40) won the Distance Championship.