NEW ORLEANS – Golden Soul arrived at Fair Grounds last week without fanfare.

Who knows how he would have been greeted if he had run a length faster in the Kentucky Derby?

“Orb ran the race of his life to beat us, and [Golden Soul] ran the race of his life,” said Dallas Stewart, who trains Golden Soul. “We’re very proud of our horse.”

At Turfway Park, the holiday meet ends Tuesday and will be followed the next afternoon with opening day of the three-month winter-spring meet. Through Jan. 5, there will be just one dark day since racing resumed Thursday following the short Christmas break, and that is the coming Thursday (Jan. 2).

Trainer Lynn Whiting will waste little time in getting some immediate action for his main client, Charles Cella, at the upcoming meet at Oaklawn Park.

Whiting, who makes his permanent home in Louisville, Ky., was busy this weekend transitioning his stable from Churchill Downs to his longtime winter base at Oaklawn, where a 57-day meet starts Jan. 10.

There’s no stakes action, but there’s a graded stakes winner, Solitary Ranger, set to start on the 11-race Saturday card at Fair Grounds.

Solitary Ranger, winner of the Grade 3 Arlington-Washington Futurity in September, is one of seven 2-year-olds entered in race 5, a first-level allowance also open to $50,000 claimers and carded for about 5 1/2 furlongs on grass. Other than running through fields and paddocks, Solitary Ranger has never been on turf, but his connections – trainer Wayne Catalano and owner Susan Moulton – long have considered Solitary Ranger for the surface.

Race 1

Race 1

Calder’s 12th-hour decision late Monday afternoon to scrap the Grade 3 La Prevoyante, its traditional year-end offering for long-winded female turf specialists, put a bit of a crimp in what was shaping up as a great Saturday of racing around the south Florida area.