ELMONT, N.Y. – As a gelding, Gailo Chop was ineligible to compete in Europe’s classic races for 3-year-olds, including France’s 2000 Guineas and French Derby. However, if he hadn’t been gelded, Gailo Chop might not have been good enough to compete in those races.

CYPRESS, Calif. – Trainer Doug O’Neill needed 27 winners to secure the championship at the 38-day spring-summer meeting that ended last weekend at Santa Anita. If O’Neill cracks double digits in wins at the current Los Alamitos summer meeting, he might earn consecutive titles.

The summer meeting began Thursday and has two four-day weeks through July 13. With so few racing dates, a trainer will not need many winners to be prominent in the standings.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Ramon Morales, one of the leading trainers in Puerto Rico, will take up residence on the local backstretch this weekend with a string of 25 horses for track owner Frank Stronach. Morales, who has won more than 1,200 races, including 82 stakes, spent the last several days at Stronach’s Adena Springs Farm in Ocala, Fla., picking the horses he will bring back to Gulfstream for the summer, including a large contingent of 2-year-olds.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Trainer Kathy Ritvo could have run her 3-year-old Fast Anna in this Saturday’s $75,000 Cherokee Run Stakes. Instead, she’s taking the more conservative route with the promising son of Medaglia d’Oro, who’ll go postward as the odds-on favorite to capture a 6 1/2-furlong first-level allowance Sunday.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Trainer Jose Garoffalo said Wildcat Red bounced out of his easy victory in last Saturday’s Quality Road Stakes at Gulfstream Park in good order and that he has mapped out plans to get his multiple graded stakes winner ready for the Grade 1 Haskell Invitational at Monmouth Park on July 27.

“Right now, the Haskell is our first option,” Garoffalo said. “I hope to breeze him here on the 13th, ship to New Jersey a couple of days after that, and then work him at Monmouth on the 20th.”

Retama Park near San Antonio has made notable changes to its most prestigious races, the El Joven and La Senorita stakes for 2-year-olds at a mile on turf. The races have been moved up a month, positioning them as potential stepping-stones to the Breeders’ Cup, while the purse for each has been boosted from $75,000 to $100,000.

Trainer Bret Calhoun could have four starters in each division of the Texas Thoroughbred Association Sales Futurity at Lone Star Park on July 12. The series is for 2-year-olds at five furlongs, and each side of the race has an estimated purse of $100,000.

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – After winning the Black Tie Affair Stakes earlier in June with the homebred The Pizza Man, the Midwest Thoroughbreds operation of Rich and Karen Papiese took down the $125,000 Iowa Sprint last Friday night with the Illinois homebred Work All Week.

“We feel good about buying those types of horses, but to have a homebred that runs that well, it’s an even better feeling,” Rich Papiese said. “It’s sort of like having your own minor-league system.”

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – Global View, after working five furlongs on Polytrack in 1:01.40 on Sunday, traveled by van to Belmont Park on Monday and is on track to start Saturday in the $1.25 million Belmont Derby.

“Everything went good,” said trainer Tom Proctor.

Gantry, Class Included, and Sunbean, who are among the top older horses based in the Mid-South region, are each targeting campaigns later in the year. The horses owned by Brittlyn Stable are based with trainer Ron Faucheux at the Evangeline Training Center near Lafayette, La.

Gantry is a Grade 2 winner of $822,531. He last raced on June 21, and finished fifth in the $300,000 Evangeline Downs Turf Sprint. Gantry was one of the top choices in the race on the strength of his win in the $58,800 Colonel Power on turf at Fair Grounds in March.