Six horses, including last year’s winner, have been nominated for the 2013 Secretariat Vox Populi Award, which was instituted four years ago by the owners of Secretariat to “recognize the racehorse whose popularity and racing excellence best resounded with the public,” the organizers of the award have announced.

The inaugural $300,000 Zia Park Oaks drew a field of nine Sunday led by Southern California shippers Unusual Way and Oscar Party. The lineup also includes Gold Medal Dancer and Sister Ginger, who finished second and third in the $200,000 Remington Park Oaks.

The Zia Oaks, a 1 1/16-mile race for 3-year-old fillies, anchors a new Land of Enchantment program that will be run next Sunday. The card features five stakes worth $845,000 in total. The program is the second-richest of the meet at Zia behind the $2 million New Mexico Cup. 

Bobby Burch, whose nearly 30-year career working for the Jockey Club and its affiliated companies spanned the beginning of the computer age to modern technology, will retire as president of the Jockey Club Technology Services Inc. at the end of 2013. He intends to remain connected to the Jockey Club as a consultant.

Harold Palmer, the company’s vice president of software and a 30-year employee, will succeed Burch as head of TJCTS.

Suffolk Downs in Massachusetts will seek to open a casino on the portion of its property that is located in a township that approved the project despite the rejection of the proposal by a neighboring town, the track said in a letter to state gambling regulators.

Bill Tallon, the popular head of the Canadian office of Daily Racing Form in Toronto, retired Friday after a 35-year career with the newspaper.

Tallon began going to the track with his father in 1965. He witnessed and wagered on countless major races, including Secretariat’s final start in the 1973 Canadian International Championship. He also attended many recent Breeders’ Cups, not as a journalist but as a fan.

MIAMI – Bill White has been stabled at Calder Race Course since 1986 and, in his 27 years at the south Florida oval has won 15 individual training titles. It is easy to understand why White decided to keep his large outfit bedded down at Calder while so many of his colleagues migrated across town to Gulfstream Park at the beginning of the head-to-head conflict between the two south Florida Thoroughbred facilities that began in earnest July 1.

A pair of $75,000 stakes scheduled for Sunday have been postponed and a quarantine has been imposed as the result of a horse testing positive for equine herpesvirus at Parx Racing in suburban Philadelphia.

According to Sal Sinatra, Parx’s director of racing, a horse trained by Steve Klesaris was among six ailing animals sent to a clinic for testing, which confirmed one positive result for equine herpesvirus. Barn 21, which houses about 20 Klesaris runners and horses from four other trainers, has been placed under quarantine and none of the horses may train.

The 2-year-old half-brother to champion sprinter Black Caviar, purchased as a yearling for an Australian record $4.65 million, has contracted a life-threatening case of laminitis, according to multiple reports in the Australian press.

The colt, who is not yet officially named and is called “Jimmy,” was given just a 50-50 chance of survival Thursday following a series of freak events. Jimmy apparently was bitten by a spider about two weeks ago while stabled at Grace Park in Connewarre, Australia, and was taken to Werribee Veterinary Clinic, where he was treated with antibiotics.

Javier Castellano, who was unseated when his mount Atlantic Dream stumbled and fell past the wire of Wednesday’s ninth race, was treated and released from North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, N.Y., where tests came back negative last night.

Castellano took off his mounts Thursday due to general soreness, but plans to ride Friday, according to agent Matt Muzikar.

Turallure, the stretch-running gray who was beaten maybe an inch by longshot Court Vision in a memorable renewal of the Breeders’ Cup Mile in 2011 at Churchill Downs, was euthanized Thursday at the Rood & Riddle Equine Hospital shortly after breaking down in a routine gallop at Keeneland in Lexington, Ky.