When it comes to the rich grass races on the Dubai World Cup program, horses trained in North America are batting a big, fat zero.Zero for the 21 runnings of the Dubai Sheema Classic at about a mile and one-half.Zero for the 19 runnings of the Dubai Turf, formerly the Dubai Duty Free, at about a mile and one-eighth.Zero for the nine runnings of the Al Quoz Sprint since it became part of the big night, formerly run at about five furlongs and now stretched out to about six.Reigning turf champion Stormy Liberal and Long On Value have been second in the last two runnings of the Al Quoz. Both Whilly and The Tin Man finished a solid but unthreatening second in the Duty Free. All were well compensated for their efforts, but there is nothing like a win photo to show the folks back home.On Saturday night, Tom Proctor will wade into this deep and unforgiving trend with Caribou Club for the Glen Hill Farm of Craig Bernick and family. The 5-year-old gelding will be part of a full-court American press to take the $2 million Al Quoz, lining up in the gate with Stormy Liberal and the mare Belvoir Bay from the Peter Miller barn.If Proctor was concerned about the American shutout on the Dubai grass, he was hiding it well when reached Monday while packing for his first adventure in the Middle East. A native of East Texas, whose idea of meditation is Stevie Ray Vaughan cranked up to 11, Proctor was asked if he feared the strong international competition his horse would be facing Saturday night.“It’s like the time I told Shoemaker that I wasn’t scared of something I’d never seen,” Proctor began.This would have been in the spring of 1984, when Proctor had just turned 28 and Shoemaker was, well, Bill Shoemaker.“He was taking off a filly of mine who’d won three of four to ride a filly called Salt Spring,” Proctor continued. “He told me she was a freak and asked me if I’d be mad if he rode her. I told him I wasn’t mad, but I was kind of insulted. When he said he didn’t think I ought to run against her, that’s when I told him I wasn’t scared of something I hadn’t seen.”Let the record show that in an allowance race at Hollywood Park on May 18, 1984, Penny Profit, ridden by Marco Castaneda and trained by Thomas Proctor, won for fun, while Salt Spring, an Argentine stakes winner making her U.S. debut under Shoemaker, finished third.Among the Al Quoz runners Proctor has never seen are likely favorite Blue Point, former champ The Right Man, and a phalanx of Australian speedballs that point hungrily for this race.Stormy Liberal, on the other hand, is very familiar to the Proctor camp. He beat Caribou Club by less than a length in the Eddie D last year at Santa Anita, then the Glen Hill runner turned the tables on the champ in the Joe Hernandez at the beginning of the year, winning by a length and a quarter.Caribou Club is a chestnut son of City Zip whose Glen Hill female line goes back to the 1960s. He has won seven of 17 starts, including Grade 2 Seabiscuit Handicap last year going 8 1/2 furlongs on the Del Mar grass. After aiming for the Kilroe Mile at Santa Anita, originally set for the canceled March 9 program but now scheduled for Saturday, Proctor and Bernick opted for Dubai. Joe Talamo has shipped for the ride.“We weren’t confident they’d even be running this weekend,” Proctor said of Santa Anita. “And he’s the kind of horse you can pretty much take anywhere and figure he’ll run his race.”The fatal injuries to 22 horses at Santa Anita this winter will continue to hang heavily over the racing conversation even as runners from the West Coast travel far and wide. Proctor lost the 5-year-old mare Last Promise Kept in the Megahertz Stakes on Jan. 21, run over a turf course labeled “good.”“I really think hers might have been track-related,” Proctor said. “The jockey said he felt her back end went out like she slipped on the wet part of the racetrack.”In the fallout from the fatalities, sweeping changes in medication and oversight have been either instituted as house policy by the Stronach Group, Santa Anita’s owner, or proposed as statewide rule changes. In addition, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office has issued subpoenas to the trainers of the 22 fatalities, as part of an investigation by the California Horse Racing Board.“It looks like they just want to look at your health records, which is fine,” Proctor said.All competitors in the Dubai World Cup program will be racing without any medication administered on Saturday and subject to a detailed list of deadlines for any drugs used during training. Caribou Club has reproduced his form in Maryland, New York, California, Kentucky, and Canada, so if he can do it again under local rules down Meydan’s 1,200-meter straightaway, he should be among those finishing fast in the Al Quoz.“We’ll be coming at them with seven generations,” Proctor said. “And I promise I won’t be confusing Talamo by telling him to save ground.”