Exploring has long been well-regarded by his connections, and on Sunday will get his first shot at stakes competition in the $300,000 Springboard Mile at Remington Park. The race for 2-year-olds closes out the meet, and it anchors a special afternoon card of four stakes worth a cumulative $450,000.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Earlier this year, trainer Michael Doyle was convinced that his 2-year-old filly Rutherford Rd did not care for the Polytrack surface here at Woodbine.

Three unplaced tries in Polytrack sprints, followed by a front-running win at 20-1 at seven furlongs on the turf, had seemed ample evidence for Doyle’s belief in Rutherford Rd’s preferences.

“She didn’t seem to like it in the spring,” said Doyle, who trains Rutherford Rd for the Kinghaven Farm of Bill Graham. “But now I think that it was more like she didn’t like being hustled, in the short races.

Norberto Arroyo Jr. is making the most of his latest chance. Arroyo, who was awarded a conditional jockey’s license this fall by the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, has caught the attention of horsemen at Turfway Park and already is a major contender for the leading-rider title at the holiday meet.

Arroyo had 2 wins and 2 seconds from 5 mounts Thursday night at the northern Kentucky track, leaving him just four shy of the 1,000-win milestone and giving him a 5-for-16 record with his first mounts since August 2009.

Aha Moment would not be a surprise winner of the Los Alamitos Two Million Futurity on Dec. 16.

Already this year, the Texas-bred colt qualified to the $2 million All American Futurity at Ruidoso Downs on Sept. 3, finishing third by 1 1/2 lengths to division leader One Dashing Eagle. In his only subsequent start, Aha Moment won a division of the Los Alamitos Two Million Futurity trials on Nov. 25.

The victory put an end to any concern about his fitness in his first start since the All American Futurity.

For the first time since 1960, Spanky Broussard, a Fair Grounds Hall of Famer, isn’t caring for horses at his hometown track.

“Been training horses 50 years and can’t find a horse to train,” said Broussard, 71.

It’s strange not to see him at the barn midway down the backstretch.

“I moved in that barn when it was brand new in 1965 with Tennessee Wright and was in there with Dewey Smith,” said Broussard, who worked as an assistant for those trainers and for J.R. Smith. Wright and both Smiths are in the Fair Grounds Hall of Fame.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Mark Hoffman has spent a good deal of his time over the past several years chauffeuring his turf and synthetic-course specialist Hooh Why around the country and up into Canada to race. But all that travelling is about to come to an end.

Hooh Why, who’ll turn 7 on New Year’s Day, is on the verge of retirement. She’ll have just two more starts before becoming a broodmare in the spring, the first of those outings to come here Sunday in the $100,000 South Beach Stakes.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Fast Bullet was scratched from the Vernon Underwood Stakes at Betfair Hollywood Park last Sunday because trainer Bob Baffert was reluctant to run the colt on a deep and drying racetrack.

The consolation race was an optional claimer on Thursday, and Fast Bullet did not disappoint. Fast Bullet ($2.80) gave a stakes-caliber showing, winning the race over 6 1/2 furlongs by 7 1/4 lengths in 1:15.64. He earned a Beyer Speed Figure of 109.

“It was wasted on the allowance race,” Baffert said of the performance. “It’s a shame we had all that rain.”

NEW ORLEANS – Weeks before the Fair Grounds meet opened, veteran jockey John Jacinto began working the backstretch in search of winners, and he hasn’t stopped pushing.

The effort is paying off.

With four victories last Sunday, Jacinto capped a week in which he won with eight of 19 mounts and secured his 1,700th career victory. After winning one race Thursday on the first card of this racing week, he was tied for second with James Graham in the jockeys’ standings with 12 victories, three behind leader Rosie Napravnik.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – On the Belmont Park backstretch, Dominick Schettino’s barn is directly across from Todd Pletcher’s.

On the racing landscape, that’s about as close as many would put the two trainers.

But while Pletcher was inarguably the most successful trainer with 2-year-olds this year on the New York Racing Association circuit, Schettino is doing quite well for himself in that division.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Notacatbutallama has already proven to be quite adept on turf. But as is the case with virtually every soon-to-be 3-year-old with talent, his connections want to see how he will handle dirt.

So, even though trainer Todd Pletcher has a full arsenal of talented dirt horses to point down the Triple Crown trail, Notacatbutallama will get his chance to play in the dirt in Sunday’s $80,000 Damon Runyon Stakes at Aqueduct.