ARCADIA, Calif. – Thegirlinthatsong, a 4-year-old filly trained by Jerry Hollendorfer, has enhanced her reputation as she moves farther west.

A stakes winner as a 2-year-old at Louisiana Downs in 2013, Thegirlinthatsong won a stakes for Texas-breds at Lone Star Park last May. In November, in her fourth start for Hollendorfer, Thegirlinthatsong was second in the richest race of her career, the $309,000 Zia Park Oaks in New Mexico.

On Saturday, Thegirlinthatsong can win her first graded stakes in the $200,000 La Canada Stakes for 4-year-old fillies at Santa Anita.

Having just started Dec. 28, War Story will race Saturday in the Grade 3, $200,000 Lecomte Stakes on less than three weeks’ rest. Faced with the choice of running or waiting for the Feb. 21 Risen Star, trainer Tom Amoss and principal owner Ron Paolucci decided to race.

“Look, the options were to run here or wait for the Risen Star, and we decided this was the better choice,” Amoss said.

NEW ORLEANS – With a filly as good as Top Decile might prove to be, a horseman might skip the first round of 3-year-old stakes during January at Fair Grounds and await the more lucrative and important second round in February.

ARCADIA, Calif. – This weekend, jockey Drayden Van Dyke will have near-constant reminders of the changes and milestones in his brief riding career.

In Thursday’s eighth race at Santa Anita, Van Dyke rides Unusually Big in an otherwise nondescript maiden-claiming race. It will be his final mount as an apprentice jockey.

Friday, Van Dyke will be on a plane to South Florida where he is widely expected to receive the Eclipse Award as the nation’s outstanding apprentice jockey of 2014 on Saturday evening.

Niassa may be the local favorite in the Feb. 7 California Oaks after a nine-length victory in a one-mile optional claimer here last Thursday.

That win improved her record at Golden Gate to 2 for 2. She won an allowance sprint here in November before running third in the $200,000 Soviet Problem at Los Alamitos on Dec. 7.

Trainer Billy Morey says Niassa is still a bit green, but he was impressed with the way she opened up on the far turn of Thursday’s race.

“She accelerated around the three-eighths pole,” he said. “That’s a style you like to see.”

The top four finishers in last month’s one-mile Gold Rush Stakes – Stand and Salute, Broughton Kitten, Sandor the Hound, and Rye Patch – are expected to hook up again in Saturday’s $100,000 California Derby at 1 1/16 miles.

Stand and Salute got first run on Broughton Kitten and held him off by a half-length in the Dec. 6 Gold Rush here. Three weeks later, Broughton Kitten rallied for fourth in the one-mile Eddie Logan on the turf at Santa Anita, and he will appreciate the extra sixteenth of a mile Saturday.

On Sunday night, Carolyn Mendes celebrated her 54th birthday by eating salmon rigatoni, lots of French bread (with butter!), and dessert.

Mendes earned her dinner: Earlier on Sunday, she had made her debut as a jockey, riding the 6-year-old Mount Zion in a $6,250 claiming race at Golden Gate Fields.

Bred by Mendes, Mount Zion finished last in the six-furlong race. Mendes had hoped to do better, but she felt a sense of satisfaction in accomplishing a goal she had set for herself last year.

Salutos Amigos, winner of three stakes in his last four starts, will most likely make his next start in the Grade 3, $150,000 Toboggan Stakes here on Feb. 7, trainer and part-owner David Jacobson said Sunday.

Jacobson had said either the Toboggan or the General George at Laurel Park were a likely next spot for Salutos Amigos, who is also under consideration for a trip to Dubai in late March for the $2 million Golden Shaheen.

“The Toboggan is probably where we’ll go,” Jacobson said. “I’m always leaning toward New York.”

When initially drawn last Wednesday for its scheduled running on Saturday, the $100,000 Busanda Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at Aqueduct drew a field of six with two of those horses being late supplements. The race was postponed when Saturday’s card was canceled due to weather and safety concerns.

The Busanda was rescheduled for Friday, and nine were entered when the race was re-drawn on Sunday.

Among those who had not been initially entered were Overprepared, Been Here Before, and Stolen Victory.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Trainer Shug McGaughey said he’s still considering the one-mile Gulfstream Park Handicap on March 7 at Gulfstream Park for Honor Code’s much-anticipated 4-year-old debut. Honor Code has not started since posting an eye-catching optional-claiming win going 6 1/2 furlongs at Aqueduct on Nov. 22. Honor Code has had two easy, three-furlong breezes at Payson Park since arriving in south Florida in early December.