Rachel Alexandra returned to the track Thursday morning for the first time since her one-length defeat to Persistently in Sunday’s Grade 1 Personal Ensign Stakes.

Trainer Steve Asmussen said Rachel Alexandra galloped one mile over the Oklahoma training track.

“I’m very pleased with how she went back,” Asmussen said.

Asmussen reiterated that he will likely wait until Sept. 13 to work Rachel Alexandra again. Typically, she breezes nine days after a race, which would have had her returning to the work tab next Tuesday.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. − Linda Rice won’t win her second straight Saratoga trainer’s title, but her 2010 season at Saratoga has been a success.

Rice entered the final five days of racing here with 18 winners from 72 starters. That was good enough for second, two wins ahead of Chad Brown, who was 16 for 46. All trainers were left in the dust by Todd Pletcher, who on the strength of his deep 2-year-old division had a meet-best 30 winners from 108 starters.

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – The trainer Greg Geier has sent out a grand total of one winner from 20 starters during the 2010 Arlington Park race meet, with Country Flavor scoring an upset victory in the Grade 3 Hanshin Cup on May 29. Country Flavor has a decent chance to account for Geier’s second Arlington win of the summer when he starts Saturday in a hodgepodge edition of the Washington Park Handicap.

Plaer’s Trump makes a quick return when she faces five other older fillies and mares in the $10,000 Bill Callihan Stakes at 6 1/2 furlongs at Columbus on Saturday.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – With limited stakes options on dirt for juvenile fillies, trainer Todd Pletcher entered four of his 2-year-olds in Sunday’s Grade 1, $250,000 Spinaway Stakes at Saratoga. A total of eight was entered for the seven-furlong race.

Pletcher went in with R Heat Lightning, Sky Hosoya, Stopspendingmaria, and Valiant Passion. Pletcher was considering entering a fifth starter but elected to wait for an overnight stakes at Belmont Park with Summer Laugh, a 6 3/4-length winner of her debut here Aug. 8.

The girls have taken over the playground as five Massachusetts-bred fillies gang up on one colt in the $50,000 African Prince Stakes at Suffolk Downs.

El Confidential will be making his two-turn debut in the $40,000 Ruidoso Derby, but he could go favored in the 1 1/16-mile race off his sharp form.

El Confidential has run first or second in his four starts. He’s also stakes-placed, and owns the field’s best last-race Beyer Figure. The test now is two turns, said Chris Hartman, who trains El Confidential.

“That’s what we’re trying to find out, if he can get the distance,” he said. “I don’t think he’ll have a problem with it, but we just haven’t had the opportunity to stretch him out.”

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – Thomas Tomillo, a veteran Chicago trainer, died Wednesday night at Alexian Brothers Hospital in Elk Grove Village, Illinois. Tomillo, 66, was suffering from pancreatic cancer, according to jockey agent Kenny Danna, a longtime Tomillo associate.

Gulfstream Park has always geared its meeting toward 3-year-olds, and that program will only get richer and better next winter in light of the 2011 stakes schedule, which the track released late Thursday afternoon. The 79-day meet begins Jan. 5.
The stakes schedule will be the richest in track history for 3-year-olds and once again will be highlighted by the $1 million Florida Derby, which will be run Sunday, April 3, one day shy of five weeks in advance of the Kentucky Derby. The Grade 1 Florida Derby, which has produced 21 Kentucky Derby winners, was worth $750,000 last year.

Meadow Magic, winner of the July 31 Dowling Stakes at Pinnacle Race Course, will have to shoulder high weight of 122 pounds when he faces eight rivals, including two James Jackson-trained stablemates, in the $50,000 Mackinac Handicap at Pinnacle Race Course. The Mackinac, at 1 1/16 miles, is for Michigan-bred 3-year-old colts and geldings and will go as the eighth race.

Leading rider Tommy Molina gets the mount on Meadow Magic, who was third in his last start, an Aug. 17 allowance race at Presque Isle Downs. Meadow Magic has 2 wins and 2 thirds from 4 starts this year.