SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Al Stall Jr. could easily have been tempted to try his injury prone but talented Tom’s d’Etat in next Saturday’s Grade 1 Whitney. After all, the 6-year-old son of Smart Strike is perfect in two starts at Saratoga and is coming off a game third-place finish behind Seeking the Soul in the Grade 2 Stephen Foster six weeks earlier at Churchill Downs.

A couple of last-out stakes winners are foremost among the 2-year-olds being pointed to the first six-figure stakes of the summer meet at Gulfstream Park in South Florida.

Positively Awesome, a 2 3/4-length winner of the June 30 Kodiak Island, and Lenzi’s Lucky Lady, a 5 1/4-length winner of the June 28 Golden Isles, head the prospective lineups for the six-furlong stakes – the $100,000 Dr. Fager for 2-year-olds and the $100,000 Desert Vixen for fillies, respectively – that kick off the annual Florida Sire Stakes series on Saturday, Aug. 3.

Trainer Brad Cox has the morning-line favorite in the Sunday feature at Ellis Park in western Kentucky in Take That for Data, who will have Florent Geroux aboard in the $52,000 second-level allowance at 1 1/16 miles on turf. It’s the eighth of nine races on a card that starts at 12:50 p.m. Central.

Ellis will conduct racing Monday – normally a dark day – as the track makes up one of two cards (July 19-20) recently canceled due to oppressive heat. First post for an eight-race card is 12:50.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Covfefe had her final breeze for the Grade 1 Test next Saturday (Aug. 3) at Saratoga, going a half-mile Friday in 47.80 seconds over a fast track at Churchill.

“Nice and easy,” said trainer Brad Cox. “I didn’t need her to do too much. Her last work was the big one.”

Owned by the LNJ Foxwoods of the Roth family, Covfefe will be looking to rebound off a third-place finish in the June 22 Roxelana at Churchill. The daughter of Into Mischief shattered a 29-year-old Pimlico record for six furlongs in her preceding start, the May 17 Miss Preakness.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Hog Creek Hustle was scheduled to breeze this weekend at Churchill Downs as the Grade 1-winning colt begins his serious preparations for his next race, the Allen Jerkens on Aug. 24 at Saratoga.

“I really kind of wish Aug. 24 would hurry up and get here,” said Vickie Foley, who trains Hog Creek Hustle for a partnership headed by Patty Tipton and friends. “He’s a physically fit horse and he’s training beautifully.”

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – The final seven races of Thursday’s 11-race card at Saratoga were canceled after unexpected heavy rains rendered the main track unusable.

“On a day when there was zero forecast for rain, we were caught by a weather situation where we don’t feel it is safe for our equine athletes or our human athletes to continue,” Martin Panza, NYRA’s senior vice president of racing operations said. “It appears there is more rain coming, and it is not something we feel we could have fixed quickly enough.”

Wednesday was a day of mixed emotions for trainer Steve Asmussen, who won the $150,000 New York Derby at Finger Lakes with Bankit a short while before his Mia Mischief finished fourth as the 6-5 favorite here in the Grade 2 Honorable Miss.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Annals of Time could be headed to the Grade 1, $800,000 Sword Dancer Invitational following his eye-catching 4 1/2-length victory in a third-level allowance race Wednesday at Saratoga.

Annals of Time won the Grade 1 Hollywood Derby as a 3-year-old in 2016, and has raced only three times since, owing to a soft tissue injury. Wednesday, he was running 1 3/16 miles for the first time. He covered the distance in 1:54.71 and earned a 98 Beyer Speed Figure.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Win Win Win is getting the remainder of the year off and will be pointed to a 4-year-old campaign, trainer Mike Trombetta said Thursday.

A recent winner of the Manila Stakes, a one-mile turf race at Belmont on July 4, Win Win Win was thought to be a candidate for either the $1 million Saratoga Derby on Aug. 4 or perhaps the Grade 1 H. Allen Jerkens, a seven-furlong dirt race on Aug. 24. But Trombetta feels the horse is in need of a rest and was sent to owner Charlotte Weber’s Live Oak Plantation in Ocala, Fla., earlier this week.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Campaign is likely to start in the Grade 1 Pacific Classic on Aug. 17 after winning his second main-track marathon this year in Wednesday’s Grade 3 Cougar II Handicap at Del Mar.

Campaign ($3.40) closed from last in a field of five to catch a stubborn stretch leader in Itsinthepost and win by 1 1/4 lengths, finishing 1 1/2 miles in 2:32.36. He earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 94.

Campaign, who was ridden by Rafael Bejarano, trailed Itsinthepost by 2 1/2 lengths with a quarter-mile remaining.