NEW ORLEANS – Mark Valeski did nothing in a Tuesday morning workout to suggest he isn’t a deserving favorite in Sunday’s $1 million Louisiana Derby, breezing a brisk five furlongs in 1:00.60 under race-rider Rosie Napravnik. The drill earned a bullet, though Tuesday was a light work day at Fair Grounds, with only 14 horses posting five-furlong breezes.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Whistleblower, who kept tough company after a maiden win early at the inner track meet, drops to the $50,000 optional claiming/starter allowance ranks in Thursday’s eighth race.

Whistleblower returned from a five-month layoff for trainer Ken McPeek and beat maiden sprinters impressively enough to run back five weeks later in the Count Fleet Stakes, where he finished sixth behind Alpha. He then turned back to a six-furlong allowance and ran a close fourth to Hardened Wildcat, who returned to take the Fred “Cappy” Capossela Stakes.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark.- A filly who hooked leading Kentucky Oaks contender Princess Arabella at Santa Anita, and an older horse who has been knocking on the door all meet at Oaklawn Park, head a pair of first-level allowance features to be run at the track on Thursday.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Oaklawn Park’s biggest guns were out for major works Tuesday, with Caleb’s Posse tuning up for the Grade 1, $400,000 Carter at Aqueduct and On Fire Baby putting in an endurance move that readied her for either the 1 1/16-mile Fantasy or the 1 1/8-mile Arkansas Derby. She is to make her next start in one of those races, both of which are in the final week of the meet at Oaklawn.

ARCADIA, Calif. - One cold, wet afternoon has revived trainer Neil Drysdale's season.
Sunday, Drysdale swept the two turf stakes at Santa Anita with the veteran Bourbon Bay in the Grade 2 San Luis Rey Stakes and Vamo a Galupiar in the Grade 2 Santa Ana Stakes. They represent the first two graded stakes winners for the barn this year.[bc_video_id:247271:]

"We had a slow start," he said.

The stable may have a big finish to the winter-spring meeting.

Winter Memories, who has not started since finishing fourth in the Grade 1 QEII Cup at Keeneland on Oct. 15, is training like a horse just about ready to run. But trainer James Toner said his Grade 1 winner may not make her 2012 debut until May 5 at Belmont in the Grade 3 Beaugay.

Winter Memories, runner-up in the 2010 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf and winner of the Grade 1 Garden City last fall at Belmont, has had six workouts over the Palm Meadows turf course since returning to training this winter, including a bullet five-eighths in 58.33 seconds on Monday.

As a 2-year-old, Fort Loudon was the favorite son at Calder, the winner of all three legs of the open division of the Florida Stallion Stakes and a respectable seventh, despite breaking from the outside, in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.

On Saturday, Fort Loudon will be anything but the favorite, and in fact he’ll likely be the longest price in the field in the $1 million Florida Derby. But trainer Stanley Gold is willing to give the son of Awesome of Course one more chance at the big time.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Hot trainer Neil Drysdale hits restart Thursday at Santa Anita, where comebacker Fire With Fire makes his California debut on the same course that last week produced three Drysdale victories, including Grade 2 wins by Bourbon Bay and Vamo a Galupiar.

Fire With Fire’s main challengers in the race 7 feature are dropping from Grade 1 races into the second-level allowance at nine furlongs on grass – likely favorite Holladay Road finished fourth in the Big Cap; Massone finished sixth in the Frank E. Kilroe Mile.

NEW ORLEANS – Halfway through the Colonel Power, a turf-sprint stakes on Feb. 25 at Fair Grounds, Zeb was winning, and his trainer, Greg Foley, wasn’t liking it.

“He bounced right out of there onto the lead, and he probably didn’t really want to be there,” Foley said.

Sister Glady Oh La will seek her fourth straight victory, all for trainer Steve Sherman, in a $62,500 optional claimer in Thursday’s sixth race.

Sister Glady Oh La has won two straight at the race’s level and distance, one mile on the Tapeta.