OCEANPORT, N.J. - Less than 48 hours after winning two Breeders' Cup races, including the Juvenile Fillies with Indian Blessing, trainer Bob Baffert was back in California, letting success sink in.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - It sometimes looks like Todd Pletcher is made of Teflon - not a knock on Pletcher, rather a mirror into his ultra-organized, fanatically professional approach to training racehorses and running one of the world's most powerful stables.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - Steve Asmussen dashed out of his New Jersey hotel before dawn Sunday morning. There was work to do. It's that way pretty much year-round for Asmussen, who trains 200 horses on several different fronts.

But on Monday in Kentucky, he still was savoring the Breeders' Cup Classic victory on Saturday at Monmouth Park by Curlin, whose coda to a brilliant 2007 season will most assuredly bring Curlin honors as both Horse of the Year and champion 3-year-old male.

"I'm better than I ever remember being," Asmussen said with a laugh.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - From the time Ginger Punch guaranteed herself a spot in the Breeders' Cup Distaff by winning the Go for Wand at Saratoga in July, trainer Bobby Frankel continuously harped on the reasons not to run in the race.

Since Ginger Punch was not nominated to the Breeders' Cup as a foal, it cost owner Frank Stronach $180,000 to supplement her to the Distaff. Frankel fretted about the speed-favoring nature of Monmouth Park's surface and the fact that if a horse drew an outside post in a big field, that supplemental fee would "be flushed away."

OCEANPORT, N.J. - By winning Saturday's $2 million Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Turf at Monmouth Park, Lahudood went from afterthought to likely champion, providing a fitting conclusion to what has been a roller-coaster year for her trainer, Kiaran McLaughlin.

Five months ago, McLaughlin had a stable that included defending Horse of the Year Invasor, soon-to-be Grade 1 winners Flashy Bull, Lear's Princess, and Shakespeare, plus Makderah, a budding filly and mare turf stakes winner. Lahudood was on few people's radar screens.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - Okay, so Kip Deville is based in New York with one of the powerhouse stables in American racing, that of Rick Dutrow, but there is no way that any horse in this year's Breeders' Cup came from more obscure origins.

Bred in Oklahoma by the Center Hills Farm, Kip Deville is a son of the $2,500 stallion Kipling and the mare Klondike Kaytie, a daughter of Encino. The horse was "live" on the board in his career debut - an Oklahoma-bred maiden race on Nov. 14, 2005, at Remington Park. He won by more than three lengths. The race's purse was $14,000.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - From unraced maiden to Horse of the Year, all in nine months. That was the story arc for Curlin. He began his career in February, and completed a sensational, ambitious 2007 campaign Saturday at Monmouth Park with an emphatic victory in the $5 million Breeders' Cup Classic, a win that should clinch for Curlin both Horse of the Year and champion 3-year-old male.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - Trainer Nick Zito had run in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile before, but often with reticence. The record of horses who had won the Juvenile, and then the Kentucky Derby, had been as bare as a newborn baby, which gave Zito pause. But two things changed Zito's mind about running this year. First, the Juvenile-Derby drought was broken earlier this year by Street Sense. And Zito correctly realized he had a chance to nail down a championship if War Pass could win the Juvenile.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - Curlin, who had not raced before February, completed a sensational, ambitious campaign Saturday at Monmouth Park with an emphatic victory in the $5 million Breeders' Cup Classic, a win that should clinch for Curlin both Horse of the Year and champion 3-year-old male.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - George Washington had to be euthanized on the racetrack after suffering a catastrophic injury to his right front ankle during the running of Saturday's $5 million Breeders' Cup Classic at Monmouth Park.

According to Dr. C. Wayne McIlwraith, the on-call veterinarian for the American Association of Equine Practitioners, George Washington incurred an open fracture of the cannon bone in the right front fetlock joint and also fractured both sesamoids.