DEL MAR, Calif. – Some of the great, unexplained mysteries in life include the identity and fate of D.B. Cooper, how the Nazca Lines in Peru were carved so precisely without a view from high above, and how American Cleopatra paid 7-1 when winning her debut Sunday at Del Mar.

American Cleopatra, the 2-year-old full sister to Triple Crown winner American Pharoah, was cold on the board off a 4-1 morning line but ran like a 7-5 shot, winning by two lengths going 5 1/2 furlongs and earning a spot in the Grade 1, $300,000 Del Mar Debutante going seven furlongs Sept. 3.

Smack Smack and Shotgun Kowboy, who finished a neck apart when first and second in last month’s Grade 3 Cornhusker at Prairie Meadows, are set to meet again Saturday night in the $175,000 Downs at Albuquerque Handicap at the New Mexico track.

Smack Smack is the 122-pound highweight for the Downs at Albuquerque, which will be run over 1 1/8 miles. He will break from the rail in the eight-horse field and is to be ridden by Shane Laviolette. Smack Smack won two stakes last year in New Mexico, including the $165,000 Zia Park Distance Championship at 1 1/8 miles in November.

Sharp Azteca figures to be favored over 13 others Saturday in the $100,000 Prelude Stakes at Louisiana Downs. He is invading from Monmouth Park for the race, which serves as the local prep for the Grade 3, $400,000 Super Derby.

The Prelude will be part of a program of seven stakes worth a total of $450,000. The other races form the Louisiana Cup, with a marquee matchup of The Pickett Factor and millionaires String King and Sunbean in the $75,000 Turf Classic. The stakes are the first of the meet at Louisiana Downs.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – As the rain fell outside of his office door Sunday morning, trainer Chad Brown was quite thankful that the Grade 2 Bowling Green Handicap had been run the previous day.

Brown had selected the $250,000 Bowling Green for Flintshire because he wanted to run the horse on firm ground. The rain began to fall late Saturday night, continued through Sunday, and forced that day’s six turf races to be run on the main track.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Off the Tracks, the winner of the Grade 1 Mother Goose in her last start, will run in Saturday’s Grade 1, $500,000 Test Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at seven furlongs, trainer Todd Pletcher said Sunday.

Off the Tracks also was under consideration for the Grade 1 Alabama at 1 1/4 miles on Aug. 20.

“She’s ready to run now,” Pletcher said. “She had success around one turn sprinting before. Felt like right now, at this moment, it’s a more logical play than waiting on the mile and a quarter.”

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Aron Wellman believes that when you have a hot hand, you’ve got to keep playing it. Thus, Wellman’s Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners, fresh off a two-win Sunday at Saratoga, will take a swing in Saturday’s Grade 1, $1.25 million Whitney Stakes with Comfort.

Comfort himself is hot, having won his two starts this year and three straight dating back to last November. But even Wellman said that Comfort will be taking “a colossal step up in class” against the likes of Grade 1 winners Frosted, Effinex, and Noble Bird in the Whitney.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Arnaud Delacour said A. P. Indian appears to have come out of his victory in Saturday’s Grade 1 Alfred G. Vanderbilt in good order and that the Grade 1 Forego on Aug. 27 is definitely on his radar.

A. P. Indian posted his fourth victory in a row – the last three since Joe Bravo became his rider – and gave Delacour the first Grade 1 win of his training career. He won by 1 1/4 lengths over Holy Boss in the six-furlong Vanderbilt.

Corey Lanerie became the 70th jockey in North American racing history to hit the 4,000-win mark when guiding Crooked Stick to victory for trainer Alex Clarkson in the seventh race Sunday at Ellis Park in western Kentucky.

Lanerie, 41, had won the previous race aboard Taliaferro County.

Jockey Victor Espinoza won the Clement Hirsch on Stellar Wind, narrowly defeating Gary Stevens and Beholder. It was a near carbon-copy of the San Diego Handicap the previous Saturday, when Espinoza, on California Chrome, got the best of Dortmund and Stevens after a similar, stretch-long duel. The victories were important ones for Espinoza, who spent much of the first half of the year traveling, but is staying close to home this summer.

 “We’re getting consistency to our business. It’s hard when you’re on the road,” said his agent, Brian Beach.

DEL MAR, Calif. – The plans for Stellar Wind for the late summer and fall had been set in stone even before she defeated Beholder in the Grade 1 Clement Hirsch Stakes on Saturday, but the loss by Beholder may alter her near-term schedule, putting in jeopardy a title defense against males in Del Mar’s biggest race of the summer, the Grade 1, $1 million Pacific Classic on Aug. 20.

 Stellar Wind has had the Breeders’ Cup Distaff on Nov. 4 at Santa Anita as her year-end goal, and she’ll race just once before that, in the Grade 1 Zenyatta at Santa Anita on Oct. 1.