INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Goldencents, the winner of the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile at Santa Anita last month, will skip the $300,000 Malibu Stakes at Santa Anita on Dec. 26 in favor of the $200,000 Strub Stakes for 4-year-olds on Jan. 18.

Owners Glenn Sorgenstein and Josh Kaplan made the decision on Wednesday after discussing options with trainer Doug O’Neill, Sorgenstein said. Goldencents was seventh as the 3-1 favorite in the Grade 1 Cigar Mile at Aqueduct on Nov. 30.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – The goal for Arethusa in the $100,250 Sharp Cat Stakes at Betfair Hollywood Park on Nov. 16 was to get a stakes placing for a filly who was winless in her first three starts.

Arethusa delivered much more, closing from last in a field of six to win the Sharp Cat Stakes by an emphatic 8 1/4 lengths as a 10-1 outsider. The win has led to greater expectations for Saturday’s $500,000 Hollywood Starlet Stakes, a Grade 1 over the same 1 1/16 miles as the Sharp Cat.

Trainer Eddie Plesa Jr. and jockey Paco Lopez had themselves a very good summer on the New Jersey Shore. They are also enjoying themselves quite a bit since getting down to south Florida and settling in for the winter at Gulfstream Park.

Plesa sent out four winners, two apiece on Saturday and Sunday and all with Lopez aboard, to take a quick lead in the trainer standings. Lopez did even better, posting seven victories on opening weekend.

“Just one of those things when you are on a good streak and things are clicking,” said Plesa.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. –    Mucho Macho Man’s legion of fans had reason to rejoice on Wednesday after trainer Kathy Ritvo and stable manager Finn Green confirmed the decision to race the defending Breeders’ Cup Classic champion again in 2014.

“We’re excited to say he’s going to campaign again next year,” said Green, who manages all stable operations for Mucho Macho Man’s principal owners, Dean and Patti Reeves. “And we’re looking forward to and hopeful for a campaign that will end up again at Santa Anita.”

The results from Churchill Downs’s all-2-year-old closing-day card Saturday bode well for Fair Grounds this winter.

Tapiture, the 4 1/4-length winner of the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes, and Vexed, a one-length winner of the Golden Rod Stakes, were shipping from Louisville, Ky., to New Orleans on Tuesday.

Two Saturday maiden winners for trainer Dallas Stewart, the filly Unbridled Forever (she of the 96 Beyer Speed Figure) and the colt Commanding Curve, both arrived at Fair Grounds on Monday.

Diego Saenz has quietly become one of the winningest jockeys based in Louisiana. He ranks 18th among all riders in North America in wins this year, with 185, and is the leading rider at Delta Downs in Vinton. Saenz in September wrapped up his fourth title at Evangeline Downs in Opelousas.

Saenz, 35, is a native of Chihuahua, Mexico, who as a child moved with his family to the East Texas town of Whitehouse. Some of his initial exposure to the Thoroughbred industry came by working at the nearby Oak Leaf Training Center.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Egg Drop, the winner of Sunday’s Grade 1 Matriarch Stakes at Betfair Hollywood Park, will be entered in Keeneland’s January sale of horses of all ages but might be withdrawn to continue her racing career.

Billy Koch, the managing partner of the Little Red Feather Racing stable that owns Egg Drop, said Tuesday that a decision on the future of the 4-year-old filly will be made later this month.

The 2014 Golden Gate Fields stakes schedule for the winter-spring meet resembles last year’s. There is one notable exception among the 11 stakes scheduled for the meet, which begins Dec. 26 and runs through June 15, 2014.

The $50,000 Lost in the Fog, formerly a sprint for 2-year-olds that closed the meeting, is now a sprint for older horses on Feb.  17. The Lost in the Fog takes the place of the $50,000 Albany Stakes, which will be run at five furlongs on turf on the last Saturday of the meet, June 14.

Though he didn’t win the Remsen, trainer Todd Pletcher did win three races restricted to 2-year-olds on Saturday at Aqueduct, including the Grade 2 Demoiselle with Stopchargingmaria.

Pletcher also won with a pair of good-looking maidens who overcame troubled starts to win. The filly Dame Dorothy broke slowly, spotted the rest of the field several lengths, but managed to rally from last to win a seven-furlong maiden race by a half-length. Three races later, the colt Surfing U S A overcame a bad start to win his maiden by 2 1/4 lengths, also at seven furlongs.