SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Mike Smith has ridden some of the best female horses of all time – four, in fact, who are in the Hall of Fame, including Zenyatta, whose induction takes place in less than three weeks.

Smith, a Hall of Famer himself and still going strong at age 50, has found another fabulous filly in Songbird, who is undefeated in eight career starts. She will put that streak on the line Sunday in the Grade 1, $500,000 Coaching Club American Oaks at Saratoga, where she will meet four rivals, including Grade 1 winners Carina Mia and Weep No More.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Jockey Patrick Valenzuela has been denied a jockey’s license by the California Horse Racing Board, ending a months-long quest to resume his troubled career on the West Coast.

Wednesday, the racing board announced that it had adopted the recommendation of hearing officer Patrick Kane who proposed Valenzuela be denied a license for repeated violations for substance-abuse issues in his career. Kane recommended that Valenzuela reapply for a license in a year and that he undergo drug and alcohol testing on a weekly basis in the interim.

Dennis Snowden confirmed on Wednesday that his wife, trainer Monique Snowden, was found dead after apparently committing suicide Sunday evening. Her body was discovered underneath a bridge crossing the Green River in Enumclaw, Wash.

“The medical examiner hasn’t completed his investigation, but they showed me a piece of jewelry that belonged to her,” he said.

Monique Snowden was distraught after a horse she trained, The Chilli Man, broke down in the $50,000 Emerald Express on Sunday and had to be euthanized.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Celestine, the dominant winner of the Grade 1 Just a Game at Belmont on June 11, was not among the 10 fillies and mares entered Wednesday for Saturday’s Grade 1 Diana Stakes at Saratoga.

“She had a foot that was bothering her a little bit,” said trainer Bill Mott. “We just can’t make it. She went a week there where she wasn’t doing any good. We weren’t doing well enough to run.”

Mott was noncommittal as to what might be next for Celestine. One possible spot is the Grade 2, $400,000 Ballston Spa here on Aug. 27.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Songbird likely will face four challengers in Sunday’s Grade 1 Coaching Club American Oaks. The purse will be $500,000 provided Songbird starts.

The other confirmed starters are Carina Mia, the Grade 1 Acorn winner; Weep No More, the Grade 1 Ashland winner; and Mo d’Amour, fourth in the Mother Goose last out.

Either Paola Queen, second in the Gulfstream Oaks, or Go For Broke, a winner of two of three starts, will be the other challenger. Entries for the CCA Oaks were to be taken Thursday.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Trainer Eddie Kenneally could be in a position to win his first graded stakes at Saratoga when he sends out Bitumen in Saturday’s Grade 3, $150,000 Sanford Stakes for 2-year-olds.

The Sanford, run at six furlongs, drew a field of only five, including supplemental entrant Bay Numbers. The race will be carded as the third on an 11-race program that also includes the Grade 1 Diana for fillies and mares on turf.

DEL MAR, Calif. – The warm-up stakes are over for American Freedom, the late-developing 3-year-old trained by Bob Baffert.

After winning stakes at Pimlico and Prairie Meadows in his last two starts, American Freedom will have his Grade 1 debut in the $1.25 million Haskell Invitational at Monmouth Park on July 31. On Wednesday at Del Mar, American Freedom worked six furlongs in 1:12.20, a major exercise in the buildup to the Haskell.

“I was looking for a strong work, and he got it,” Baffert said.

DEL MAR, Calif. – After a game second to Melatonin in the Grade 1 Gold Cup at Santa Anita on June 25, Win the Space will be an outsider in Saturday’s $200,000 San Diego Handicap at 1 1/16 miles at Del Mar. Typically, a second-place finish in the Gold Cup would make Win the Space a leading contender in the Grade 2 San Diego. But the race came up unusually tough this year and is led by California Chrome, the 2014 Horse of the Year, and Dortmund, a millionaire multiple stakes winner.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Saturday’s renewal of the Grade 1 Diana is shaping up as one of the best in the 77-year history of the event, due in large part to trainer Chad Brown, who will lead over four of the 10 starters in the 1 1/8-mile turf fixture for fillies and mares.

Brown will saddle two of the likely favorites in Dacita and Wekeela, along with Mrs McDougal, the winner of the Grade 2 Lake George on opening day here last summer, and Rainha Da Bateria.

Six-time stakes winner Roadhog has been retired, according to his longtime trainer, Elizabeth Merryman.

Roadhog, 9, won stakes at Laurel Park, Parx Racing, Presque Isle, and Penn National. He retired with 10 wins from 44 starts and earnings of $670,264.

Owned and bred by the Ellendale Racing LLC of Ellen Lea and Dale Schilling, Roadhog is going to become Lea’s riding horse. Lea and Schilling own Willow Lake Farm in Bucks County, Pa.