Hialeah Park will open its second season of Quarter Horse racing on Friday. The 2010-11 meeting will consist of 24 days of live racing, Fridays through Sundays, until Jan. 23.

Hialeah reopened its doors for the first time in more than eight years last season when it conducted a Quarter Horse meet that began on Nov. 28, 2009. A crowd of more than 25,000 people greeted the horses back to one of racing’s landmark tracks, but interest waned quickly and the all-sources handle for the 2009-10 meet averaged less than $140,000 daily.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Thunder Ball and Prized Humour are the obvious protagonists in Friday’s eighth race, and Thunder Ball could turn the tables on his rival in the nine-furlong allowance that headlines the third-last day of the Woodbine Racetrack meet.

Prized Humour has had a frustrating time trying to clear this first allowance condition, since earning his diploma on Polytrack on July 2. He came up a half-length short of turning the trick on the grass Oct. 2, but could only manage fourth over yielding ground Oct. 30.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario —Trainer Ian Black is back on Canadian soil following his second journey to Japan, where he sent out Fifty Proof for last Sunday’s Japan Cup at Tokyo Racecourse.

“We had a great trip,” said Black. “We had a wonderful time. Great hosts, lovely people.”

Fifty Proof’s reception was not quite so hospitable, as the 4-year-old gelding gave way in the final furlong to finish last of 18 in the Grade 1 Japan Cup with his regular rider Justin Stein in the irons.

Live racing at Aqueduct was canceled Wednesday - the first scheduled day of racing over the inner track - due to inclement weather. There is no simulcasting either.

Heavy rains and high winds pelted the New York metropolitan area early Wednesday morning, and a high wind advisory remained in effect throughout the day.

Live racing is scheduled to resume on Thursday, first post 12:30 p.m.

Racing this past Saturday opened a window onto the 3-year-old class of 2011, with Aqueduct hosting the Remsen and Demoiselle for 2-year-olds, and Churchill’s all-juvenile program topped by the Kentucky Jockey Club and Golden Rod stakes. The 2-year-old race of note at Fair Grounds on Saturday was a short-field, entry-level allowance, but it might have provided a peek at a future stakes horse.

The only trainer with horses in as many as four races Thursday at Fair Grounds is not Steve Asmussen, not Tom Amoss, not Bret Calhoun: It is Michelle Lovell, whose barn has quickly become one to follow over the winter in New Orleans.

MIAMI – Sebastian Madrid has spent the last nine winters riding in Saudi Arabia rather than staying home and fighting the inevitable losing battle trying to secure live mounts against the cream of the Gulfstream Park jockey colony.

But Madrid won’t be leaving town this winter, and for good reason. He’s the regular rider for Gourmet Dinner, upset winner of the $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot, who is virtually assured of a starting berth in the 2011 Kentucky Derby based on graded earnings.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – From Nov. 10 through Nov. 17, trainer Rick Schosberg ran seven horses at Aqueduct. They all finished third.

“That’s got to be a record for mediocrity, and I hold it,” Schosberg said. “The only problem is the last two horses we ran finished fourth and fifth so we’re going the wrong way.”

Schosberg hopes to turn things in the opposite direction Thursday when he sends out Whateverittakes in a first-level New York-bred allowance race that serves as the feature on Aqueduct’s nine-race card.

At least the fields will be big. Given the increasingly difficult situation that Turfway Park faces in its slots-less existence, track president Bob Elliston is taking a glass-half-full approach.

“The good story coming out of our fall meet was that we averaged 9.8 horses a race, a nice number by any standard,” said Elliston, noting the reduced four-day-a-week schedule that Turfway undertook during its 16-day fall meet. “Maybe less really is more in terms of giving horseplayers what they want.”

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Well Armed, winner of the 2009 Dubai World Cup who is unraced since August 2009, has returned to trainer Eoin Harty’s stable at Hollywood Park.

The 7-year-old gelding underwent surgery in summer 2009 to have a bone chip removed from an ankle and had further setbacks earlier this year caused by illness and a slower-than-expected physical recovery that postponed his return to the racetrack. There was hope that Well Armed could return to the racetrack in the spring or summer earlier this year, but those plans were delayed.