INGLEWOOD, Calif. – The strange saga of jockey Patrick Valenzuela took another unexpected turn Thursday, when his agent reported to Hollywood Park’s stewards that Valenzuela had emergency gall bladder surgery on Thursday morning in Kansas.

“He was operated on this morning to remove his gall bladder,” Kim Sawyer, one of Hollywood Park’s stewards, said Thursday morning in the stewards’s office.

Sawyer had been in touch Wednesday and Thursday with Valenzuela’s agent, Tom Knust, who originally thought Valenzuela was going to have the surgery Wednesday night.

Ron McAnally’s first stakes win of national signficance came in 1961, when he took Verne Winchell’s Donut King to New York to win the Champagne Stakes. The horse was 2, the trainer 29.

Now, 50 years later, McAnally’s record has become part of racing’s catechism. The man may be on the quiet side, but the stats scream from the rooftop, and the particulars always make for good reading. Among the highlights, schoolchildren raised around the racetrack know that:

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – History repeats itself, doesn’t it? A promising 2-year-old colt named Gemologist sure could have tongues wagging if he remains unbeaten Saturday in the Grade 2, $150,000 Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes at Churchill Downs, a feat that would remind everyone of what Super Saver recently accomplished.

LEXINGTON, Ky. − Dr. Kendall Hansen is on good terms now with Lady Luck.

Fabulous Strike, an 8-year-old gelding who won the 2007 Grade 1 Vosburgh Stakes as a 4-year-old, has been given to Old Friends, a retirement facility for horses in central Kentucky, according to the farm.

A five-time graded stakes winner, Fabulous Strike was retired in September after winning 15 of 28 starts and earning $1,448,339 for owner/breeder Walter Downey and his Tea Party Stable.

A member of the Fair Grounds Hall of Fame since 1999, he is an eight-time leading trainer at that track, which opened its 2011-12 meeting on Thanksgiving Day. He also works as an analyst for TVG during the Kentucky Derby and Breeders’ Cup.

Birthdate: Nov. 17, 1961, in New Orleans, La.

Family: wife, Colleen; daughters, Ashley and Hayley

Rapid Redux, who set a modern American record Monday night when he won his 20th race in a row, was entered Wednesday in a 1 1/8-mile starter-allowance race scheduled for Saturday night at Charles Town Race Course, but the race failed to attract enough entrants to be used on the card.

The horse’s connections, owner Robert Cole and trainer David Wells, hoped to quickly return Rapid Redux to action as they chase another record, Citation’s 19 victories in a calendar year. So far in 2011, Rapid Redux has won 18 races.

Ramon Dominguez, the Eclipse Award-winning jockey of 2010, and respected veteran riders Corey Lanerie, DeShawn Parker, Martin Pedroza, and Scott Stevens are the finalists for the 63rd annual George Woolf Memorial Jockey Award, Santa Anita, which hosts the award, announced on Wednesday.

The Woolf Award, named for the jockey best known for riding Seabiscuit in his celebrated match race with War Admiral, is widely coveted by jockeys since it is voted on by their peers. It recognizes outstanding achievement on, and contributions off, the track.

El Padrino, a 12-length maiden winner at Belmont on Oct. 29, and Our Entourage, a maiden winner on turf, will represent trainer Todd Pletcher in Saturday’s Grade 2, $200,000 Remsen Stakes for 2-year-olds at 1 1/8 miles.

El Padrino, a son of Pulpit, finished second as the favorite in his debut at Saratoga and came out of that race with minor shin issues, Pletcher said. Over a sloppy Belmont main track on Oct. 29, El Padrino rolled to a 12 3/4-length victory.

The only tension in Rapid Redux’s record-setting win on a wet Monday night at Mountaineer Racetrack came before the race even began. Balky and lashing out with his hind legs, Rapid Redux declined to be led into his starting stall for the eighth race, where he was the 1-9 favorite and, for a moment, the focal point of the racing world.