LEXINGTON, Ky. – History of a sort will be made Friday with the running of the seventh race, a $64,000 optional claimer for 3-year-olds and up: It’s the first one-mile race on the Keeneland main track.

The race is essentially a road test prior to the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile on Oct. 30. With the 1 1/16-mile circumference of its main track, Keeneland never has contested races at a mile because of the short run into the first turn.

The stakes winners Jakaby Jade and Stays in Vegas are part of a projected field of 11 in Saturday’s $100,000 Surfer Girl Stakes for 2-year-old fillies at a mile on turf at Santa Anita.

The program also includes the $100,000 Zuma Beach Stakes for 2-year-olds over the same course and distance.

The Irish import Jakaby Jade won the Del Mar Juvenile Fillies Turf in her American debut Sept. 7, while Stays in Vegas won the Wine Country Debutante at Santa Rosa in August. Stays in Vegas was later fifth in the Grade 1 Del Mar Debutante on dirt.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – If not for running against the great Lady Eli in a $1 million race, Sentiero Italia would be undefeated since the spring. That terrific 4-for-5 streak should be enough to make the Godolphin homebred a solid favorite to knock out her first Grade 1 victory Saturday in the $500,000 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland.

Sentiero Italia enters the 32nd QE II off victories in the Lake Placid at Saratoga and the Sands Point at Belmont Park. Both are Grade 2 races in which the daughter of Medaglia d’Oro won in convincing fashion as the favorite.

The speedy Liam’s Map will be pointed to the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile on Oct. 30 at Keeneland and bypass the Breeders’ Cup Classic on Oct. 31, trainer Todd Pletcher said on Wednesday from Keeneland.

The decision has major implications for the $5 million Classic, as Liam’s Map would have added considerable pace to a race that now might find American Pharoah, the Triple Crown winner, as the controlling speed.

Imperative worked a half-mile in 47 seconds at Santa Anita on Wednesday and might start in the $200,000 Fayette Stakes at 1 1/8 miles on dirt at Keeneland on Oct. 30, the first day of the Breeders’ Cup races.

Trainer Richard Baltas said Imperative worked “very good” and that the 5-year-old gelding is likely to race without blinkers for his next start.

“I don’t think he needs them,” he said.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Shared Belief, the champion 2-year-old male of 2013, will resume training at Golden Gate Fields in early November, moving closer to an expected comeback in early 2016.

Trainer Jerry Hollendorfer said on Wednesday that Shared Belief is jogging two miles a day at the Pegasus Training Center in Washington state under the direction of trainer Mike Puhich. Shared Belief has not raced since being pulled up in the Charles Town Classic in West Virginia in April with a hip injury.

Trainer Dale Romans and the Albaugh Family Stable already have one of the favorites for the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile in Brody’s Cause, who was a good-looking winner of last Saturday’s Grade 1 Breeders’ Futurity at Keeneland.

But Romans and the Albaughs have another 2-year-old they like just as much, if not more, in Unbridled Outlaw, and are hopeful that he too can get into the Juvenile field.

An American-based winner of the $3 million Breeders’ Cup Turf at Keeneland on Oct. 31 will produce a longshot payoff.

European-based runners are expected to dominate the betting in the richest turf race in the United States. As of Wednesday, Golden Horn, the winner of the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe at Longchamp Racecourse in Paris last Sunday, was the consensus 4-5 favorite in future-book betting with British bookmakers.

Flintshire, the runner-up in the Arc and second in the 2014 BC Turf at Santa Anita, was the clear second choice at 5-2.

After briefly toying with the notion of running Private Zone in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, his connections have now all but decided on running the four-time Grade 1 winner in the Sprint, in which he is expected to be favored over Rock Fall and Runhappy.

Rene Douglas, the racing manager for Private Zone, said Wednesday that the decision is a tough one because he believes his horse would be very formidable in both spots. But in the end, the larger purse for the Sprint and Private Zone’s history of success in one-turn races helped Douglas make the final decision.

The $100,000 Surfer Girl at Santa Anita on Saturday is the last major North American prep for the Grade 1, $1 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf and should help identify at least one serious contender for the one-mile race at Keeneland on Oct. 30.