HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Oaklawn Park opened its meet Friday with a slew of new faces in the entries, but when the horses hit the wire in featured $75,000 Fifth Season, it was two-time defending riding champ Cliff Berry winning a photo aboard Donoharm. Skyring held off a late-charging Win Willy for second, with the finish thrilling the ontrack crowd of 19,633.

Attendance was up over last year's opening crowd of 18,087. Oaklawn handled $2,954,686 on its nine-race card from all sources. Of that amount, $1,835,518 was bet offtrack, and $1,119,168 ontrack.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Demonic makes his career debut in Sunday’s fourth race, and he may be the 3-year-old to follow in trainer John Sadler’s stable in coming months.

Sadler and owners Lee and Susan Searing have high expectations for Sunday’s race, and beyond.

“He’s showed a lot of run,” Sadler said. “You don’t want to get too hyped before their first race. You never know how the year will shake out.”

As a reaction to the recent rash of equine fatalities at Aqueduct, the New York State Racing and Wagering Board has mandated a necropsy be performed on each horse that suffers a racing-related fatality during Aqueduct’s inner-track meet.

The mandate began Thursday with the breakdown of Pleasantfriday, the fourth fatality since Aqueduct’s inner-track meet opened on Dec. 12.

ARCADIA, Calif. – The days of racing at 1 1/2 miles are over for Slim Shadey, a two-time stakes winner in 2012.

For 2013, Slim Shadey will be kept to races at 1 1/8 miles and 1 1/4 miles on turf, beginning with Sunday’s $150,000 San Gabriel Stakes over 1 1/8 miles at Santa Anita.

“I think the distance is slightly better for him,” trainer Simon Callaghan said. “He’s training really well for this race.”

Unlikely to find an allowance race, trainer Rick Violette will likely have to run recent maiden winner Clawback in a stakes at Aqueduct for his next start.

The question is, will Violette keep Clawback at six furlongs in the $75,000 Jimmy Winkfield on Jan. 21 or attempt to stretch him out to 1 1/16 miles in the Grade 2, $200,000 Withers on Feb. 2?

[ROAD TO THE KENTUCKY DERBY: Prep races, point standings, replays]

“I’m not sure yet,” Violette said Friday.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Charm the Maker will start in a stakes at Santa Anita in January, but a decision on whether she runs in Sunday’s $75,000 Paseana Handicap or the $150,000 La Canada Stakes on Jan. 20 may not be made until Sunday.

The winner of the Sharp Cat Stakes on the synthetic main track at Hollywood Park in November 2011, Charm the Maker has yet to win a stakes on a dirt track in three tries. She was third in the Grade 1 Oak Leaf Stakes here in October 2011.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Bruce Brown has always thought highly of Mischief Maker. That explains why he ran her against males in her career debut and in a stakes race in her second start.

It wasn’t until her last race, however, that Mischief Maker showed everybody else what Brown had been seeing.

Sunday, Mischief Maker will attempt to validate her impressive seven-length allowance win last out when she faces four rivals in the $75,000 Swirlaway Stakes for New York-bred fillies and mares going a mile over Aqueduct’s inner track.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Ramon Dominguez will head to Gulfstream Park next weekend where he most likely will accept his third straight Eclipse Award as North America’s outstanding jockey.

But it is a trip to Gulfstream on Feb. 9 that Dominguez may be even more excited about.

Dominguez will ride Animal Kingdom, the 2011 Kentucky Derby winner in the Grade 1, $300,000 Gulfstream Park Turf Handicap. Amazingly, Dominguez will become the seventh jockey to ride Animal Kingdom in what will be the colt’s 10th career start.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark.– Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas will be active in the region’s two major stakes for 3-year-olds next weekend. He said he plans to ship Oxbow to Fair Grounds for the Grade 3, $200,000 Lecomte on Saturday, while Will Take Charge is to stay home at Oaklawn Park and run in the $150,000 Smarty Jones at on Monday, Jan. 21.

NEW ORLEANS – Hugh McMahon, one of the leading trainers on the Maryland circuit, was looking for a winter base with a turf course when he decided that he would send horses to the Fair Grounds.

“We had a really good meet at the Colonial meet,” McMahon said. “We won the title there. We had grass horses. Let’s try New Orleans.”

Though wet weather has limited turf racing recently, McMahon said he’s enjoying his first season here.