HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Nick Zito has won the Kentucky Derby twice. He’d love nothing more than to win a third Derby someday for one of his newest clients, Joseph Moss, the owner of Spot, an up-and-coming 3-year-old who became a Grade 2 winner Saturday, when he upset the previously undefeated No Nay Never in the seven-furlong Swale Stakes.

Even the ever-optimistic Zito has no delusions about Spot winning the Derby, although he does believe the improving son of Pulpit could contend in a Triple Crown race later this spring.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Euphrosyne, who shares a unique name with a quality mare of yesteryear, is one of the more promising 3-year-old fillies set to run in the Grade 3, $150,000 Honeybee at Oaklawn on Saturday. She was second in last month’s $100,000 Martha Washington in her stakes debut, after launching her career last fall at Belmont Park.

ARCADICA, cALIF. - The American debut of Rhagori in Friday’s third race could lead to a stakes appearance in the near future.

Trainer Simon Callaghan has high expectations for the 5-year-old mare, who was purchased by Michael House at auction last December for approximately $150,000.

“She’s a filly I like,” Callaghan said. “I think she’s going to progress from this race.”

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ARCADIA, Calif. - Secret Circle, the winner of the Breeders’ Cup Sprint last November, remains on schedule for a start in the $2 million Golden Shaheen Sprint in Dubai on March 29, trainer Bob Baffert said.

Secret Circle has run once this year, finishing second by a neck to Wild Dude in the Grade 2 Palos Verdes Stakes over six furlongs on Feb. 2. Baffert admitted that he has some hesitation about a trip to Dubai, wondering how Secret Circle will handle the Tapeta Footings synthetic track.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Beholder, the champion 3-year-old filly of 2013, continues to train toward a springtime comeback. Monday, Beholder breezed three furlongs in 34.80 seconds, the fastest of 21 recorded works at the distance.

In Southern California, horses are typically described as working in a handily fashion, but Beholder earned the designation of breezing with an easier workout.

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Remington Park in Oklahoma City opens one of the nation’s premier Quarter Horse meets Friday night, with a stakes schedule worth more than $4.3 million and jockey G.R. Carter on the countdown to becoming the sport’s all-time winningest jockey. The track’s 50-date season will run through June 1.

WHO’S HOT

Befitting the nature of Mardi Gras itself, the finish of the Mardi Gras Stakes on Tuesday at Fair Grounds hardly could have been any wilder.

Four fillies and mares were battling in deep stretch when a fifth horse, Cozze Up Lady, suddenly appeared from nowhere, with an incredible rally carrying her and jockey Rosie Napravnik to a nose victory over Saturday Nthe Park. The first five were separated by little more than one length.

ARCADIA, Calif. – John Sadler has been trudging through the backstretch at Santa Anita for more than three decades now, steadily rising to the elite among the trainers based in Southern California. He has developed a highly successful stable that competes across all levels, from stakes racing to claimers, turf to dirt, sprinters to routers.

A pair of 3-year-olds who trained all winter at Fair Grounds before shipping out to finish one-two last Saturday in the Battaglia Memorial Stakes at Turfway Park will go next in separate races in Kentucky, trainer Wayne Catalano said Wednesday from Gulfstream Park in Florida.

Solitary Ranger led all the way to finish clear of a sustained late run by his stablemate, Poker Player, in the Battaglia, a 1 1/16-mile Polytrack race at Turfway in northern Kentucky. The Battaglia is a prep for the annual Turfway showcase, the Grade 3 Spiral Stakes on March 22.