BENSALEM, Pa. - A gambler at heart, horse owner Paul Reddam doesn’t mind taking chances.

 “We tend in our stable to try hit the ball over the fence,” Reddam said. “We strike out a lot, but every once in a while the ball does go over the fence.”

 Though he was 3,000 miles away Saturday afternoon, Reddam knocked one out of the park when Handsome Mike, the least accomplished of the seven runners in the field, ran away from the competition in the stretch to win the Grade 2, $1 million Pennsylvania Derby by two lengths at Parx.

A total lack of graded stakes experience was no problem at all for Dust and Diamonds, who dusted her more accomplished rivals in Saturday's 19th running of the Grade 2 Gallant Bloom Handicap at Belmont Park.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Amazombie worked six furlongs in 1:13.20 on Saturday, moving closer to a two-race fall campaign designed to defend his title as the nation’s champion sprinter.

Amazombie is scheduled to start in the $250,000 Santa Anita Sprint Championship on Oct. 6 followed by the $1.5 million Breeders’ Cup Sprint on Nov. 3. Both races are over six furlongs. In 2011, Amazombie won the same races. The Santa Anita Sprint Championship was then known as the Ancient Title Stakes. The BC Sprint was run at Churchill Downs.

A change of scenery, and racing surface, has kept Include Me Out on schedule for an important start in the $250,000 Zenyatta Stakes at Santa Anita next weekend.

Saturday at Santa Anita, Include Me Out worked six furlongs on turf in 1:13.80, the first time she has exercised on the surface. Trainer Ron Ellis chose a turf workout at Santa Anita for Include Me Out because of a recent renovation of the Hollywood Park main track.

Hollywood Park reopened its main track for training on Saturday after a week-long renovation that included rewaxing the synthetic surface.

The Dale Romans army of stars was out en masse Saturday morning at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., for key breezes toward their final prep races leading to the Nov. 2-3 Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita.

Most notably, Little Mike went an easy five furlongs in 1:03.40, while Dullahan went the same distance in 1:02.20 over a track playing noticeably slow.

“I’m just trying to keep them all fit and happy,” Romans said later in the morning.

Trainer Chad Brown said Awesome Feather came out of her 11 1/4-length victory in Thursday’s Nasty Storm Stakes in good order and would do the bulk of her training at Belmont for the $2 million Ladies’ Classic at Santa Anita on Nov. 2.

Awesome Feather had trained at Saratoga since early in summer, but Brown elected against shipping her back there given the change to cooler temperatures.

“I love Saratoga, I love the track, but she’s trained well here too,” Brown said Friday morning in his Belmont office. “The bottom line is I have more confidence in the weather down here.”

POMONA, Calif. – Closing day is always big for Fairplex Park, 2012 in particular. When the 13-day autumn meet ends Sunday at the Los Angeles County Fair, the significance of the closing-day feature might extend all the way to the Breeders’ Cup.

The nine older horses entered in the $100,000 Ralph M. Hinds Handicap include two with designs on the BC Marathon, and another whose performance may indicate the strength of the California contingent aiming to the BC Mile.

ELMONT, N.Y. – Trainer Dale Romans and owner Jerry Crawford have decided to switch plans for their pair of 3-year-olds, moving Dullahan to the Grade 1 Jamaica on Oct. 6 and Finnegan’s Wake to the Grade 1, $600,000 Joe Hirsch Turf Classic Invitational next Saturday.

Romans said Friday that by running Dullahan in the Jamaica at 1 1/8 miles on turf as opposed to the Joe Hirsch at 1 1/2 miles, it still leaves the door open to run in any one of three Breeders’ Cup races – the Mile, the Turf at 1 1/2 miles, or the $5 million Classic on dirt at Santa Anita.

ELMONT, N.Y. – It’s not that Awesome Feather won Thursday’s $85,000 Nasty Storm Stakes at Belmont Park that was surprising. It was the way she did it that had jaws dropping.

In her first start since January, Awesome Feather rolled to an 11 1/4-length victory in the Nasty Storm, running a mile in 1:33.47 over a Belmont main track that was playing fast.

Still, jockey Jeffrey Sanchez was far from all out on Awesome Feather, the champion 2-year-old filly of 2010 who remained undefeated in 10 starts.

ELMONT, N.Y. – Trainer Bill Kaplan doesn’t see any reason Musical Romance can’t have as good a fall campaign this year as she did last year when she upset the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint and was named champion female sprinter.

Musical Romance, away from the races for two months, will have her final prep for this year’s Breeders’ Cup on Saturday when she runs in the Grade 2, $200,000 Gallant Bloom Handicap at Belmont Park.