Sprint races often unfold with a chaotic scramble for position. And appropriately enough, that describes the picture for the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint, with four major prep races remaining in the U.S. leading up to the fourth running of the newest Breeders’ Cup event.

A field of seven will line up on Friday at Santa Anita for the Speakeasy Stakes, which offers a fees-paid berth in the Juvenile Turf Sprint to its winner. Four in the lineup are trying turf for the first time, including two of the race’s standouts, One Timer and Forbidden Kingdom.

The Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf typically comes together late. This year should be no exception.

Seven races – three overseas, four in North America – that reasonably could yield runners for the one-mile, $1 million contest remain to be run, and since these 2-year-olds have so little established form a lot can change between the last week in September and the first week in November.

One is an 8-year-old veteran who has been in the barn for years. One is a 3-year-old who has been in the barn since summer. But in Extravagant Kid and The Lir Jet, both well-traveled runners who have scored major wins at renowned international meetings, trainer Brendan Walsh has a strong duo of prospects for this year’s Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint.

The Grade 1 Joe Hirsch Turf Classic on Oct. 9 at Belmont Park will help determine some of the domestic hopes for the Breeders’ Cup Turf on Nov. 6 at Del Mar.

The home team could do with a boost in membership.

With five weeks to the Breeders’ Cup, the international candidates are a much stronger group, a roster that will be better known after Sunday’s Group 1 Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe at Longchamp Racecourse in Paris. The Arc is Europe’s richest race, with a purse of $5.8 million. The BC Turf is worth $4 million.

When it comes to the Breeders’ Cup, nobody will have more experience going into the 2021 renewal than Firenze Fire, who, if all goes according to plan, will be making his fifth appearance on the big stage when he runs at Del Mar on Nov. 6 in the $2 million Sprint.

The Sprint recently lost two of its major players due to injury, with reigning champion Whitmore and Yaupon having been retired within the past month. But the race is still expected to feature both the second- and third-place finishers from a year ago at Keeneland, C Z Rocket and Firenze Fire.

Races this Saturday in California, Kentucky, and New York should help shape the final field for the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, which at present figures to come up long on quality but short on quantity, headed as it is by in-form runners such as the brilliant Life Is Good, Met Mile winner Silver State, and Del Mar terror Ginobili.

The most obvious prep is the Ack Ack, a one-turn mile at Churchill Downs that includes Rushie, winner of the Pat Day Mile there 55 weeks ago.

Undefeated after two races, Maryland-based Koala Princess has credentials as attractive as any domestic prospect for the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf on Nov. 5 at Del Mar.

The question is how to campaign Koala Princess in coming weeks.

Trainer Arnaud Delacour and the partnership that owns Koala Princess – Runnymede Farm, Peter Callahan, and Chris Zinkhan – have the option of a start in the Grade 2 Jessamine Stakes at 1 1/16 miles on turf on Oct. 13 at Keeneland, or waiting for the Breeders’ Cup.

Some Breeders’ Cup races are easier to get a line on than others. Typically, the $2 million BC Juvenile Fillies is not one of them, at least not at this early juncture.

The reason: Three critical Win and You’re In preps still remain, and the results of those will go a long way in determining a pecking order of favoritism for the 38th Juvenile Fillies, to be run at 1 1/16 miles on Nov. 5 at Del Mar.

Those races are the 1 1/16-mile Chandelier on Friday at Santa Anita; the one-mile Frizette on Sunday at Belmont Park; and the 1 1/16-mile Alcibiades on Oct. 8 at Keeneland.

Gamine, Gamine, Gamine. A thousand times, Gamine.

That’s the name everyone will be saying and hearing as the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint draws closer. As a 6 1/4-length winner of this race last fall at Keeneland with a 110 Beyer Speed Figure and the reigning leader atop the filly-mare sprint division since then, there’s little doubt Gamine is the one to beat in the seven-furlong Filly and Mare Sprint. She is the even-money favorite on the early Daily Racing Form line composed by Brad Free among known prospects for the Nov. 6 race at Del Mar.

It seems odd to label Letruska as a late developer. After all, she began her career 7 for 7, and won 11 of her first 15 starts including Group 1s in Mexico City and Grade 3s in the United States.

But this year at age 5, Letruska did change, from above average to exceptional, winning graded stakes at four tracks including three Grade 1s. Late developer? Perhaps. As for her label this fall – Letruska is the early favorite for the Breeders’ Cup Distaff on Nov. 6 at Del Mar, listed at 2-1 on the preliminary line by Daily Racing Form.