LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The locals love coming out to Churchill Downs on the Friday after Thanksgiving, and not just to escape from the in-laws. The racing happens to be terrific, too.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Basmati, the runner-up in the $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot in Louisiana on Saturday, will make his next start in the $750,000 CashCall Futurity at Hollywood Park on Dec. 17, trainer Doug O’Neill said.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – It might be best to wait until after scratch time to begin handicapping Thursday’s Grade 3, $100,000 Fall Highweight Handicap at Aqueduct.

Though 10 were entered for the traditional Thanksgiving Day feature, the gate could be only half full when the six-furlong stakes is run at 2:42 p.m. Eastern. First post for the nine-race Thanksgiving Day card is 11:25 a.m. with last post at 3:10.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. - Hollywood Park’s Cushion Track was used for training Monday, one day after rain inundated a section of the track and forced the cancellation of three races.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Bob Black Jack, who once held the six-furlong world record, will make his first start around two turns on turf in Saturday’s $250,000 Citation Handicap.

Bob Black Jack’s career has been plagued by injuries, which have limited the 6-year-old to 12 career starts. A gelding, Bob Black Jack has made only two starts in the last two years, winning the Grade 2 San Carlos Handicap in February 2010 and finishing second in the California Cup Sprint at Santa Anita on Oct. 29. In between, he was sidelined with a suspensory injury.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – My Miss Aurelia, the undefeated winner of the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies at Churchill Downs and the surefire 2-year-old filly champion of 2011, is being shipped from Churchill to the Ocala area for a brief freshening before gearing back up for the classic races in her division next year, it was announced Tuesday.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Trainer Steve Margolis, whose current base is Churchill Downs, is in the process of relocating to Fair Grounds, where he figures to be a major player at the meeting that begins Thursday.

But Margolis, in absentia, also plans to be keeping an eye on Woodbine this Sunday, with Splendiferous slated to go postward in the $150,000 Display Stakes.

Splendiferous, a Kentucky-bred 2-year-old who is owned by Jake Ballis, has started three times on the turf and would be making his Polytrack debut in the 1 1/16-mile Display.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Seven furlongs is three furlongs short of the spring goal, yet it is an ideal launch distance for Kentucky Derby prospects trained by Mike Harrington and owned by Heinz Steinmann.

Empire Way races seven furlongs Thursday in the $100,000 Prevue at Hollywood Park, where a $62,889 pick six carryover is at stake. Creative Cause will return in a seven-furlong race in February at Santa Anita as Harrington points both 2-year-old colts toward ambitious objectives.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Todd Pletcher would like to see Super Espresso bow out the right way, and that would be by running the way she did six months ago on the Preakness undercard at Pimlico. Super Espresso is the co-highweight Thursday in the Grade 2, $175,000 Falls City Handicap at Churchill Downs.

“This is her last race,” Pletcher said. “We haven’t quite been able to get her to recapture that form she showed when she won the Allaire DuPont on Preakness Day, but she hasn’t embarrassed us, either. She’s been a consistent mare, and we’ve tried some ambitious spots with her.”

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Rustin Kretz was surveying the atmosphere at Churchill Downs on Kentucky Derby Day in 2010 when he turned to his wife, Juliana, and told her of his plans when they returned home to California.

“I have to own a racehorse,” he said.

The idea was not a passing fancy. In the following weeks, Kretz’s thoughts continually returned to Thoroughbred racing.

“I couldn’t get the idea out of my head,” he said last weekend. “We thought the whole thing was amazing.”