ELMONT, N.Y. – Opportunity knocks for someone in the Vosburgh, which is the first of five straight Grade 1 races on the biggest card of Belmont’s fall meet and the first leg of the pick six.

The nine entrants are winless from 16 collective starts at the Grade 1 level and well removed from the race’s historical Beyer Speed Figure par in excess of 110.

Indeed, morning-line favorite Girolamo has never run as short as six furlongs and has run just twice since winning the one-mile Jerome last October for Godolphin Stable.

Will a jockey change to one of trainer Todd Pletcher’s go-to riders help Hysterical Cat turn the tables on Bug Juice?

That’s the question handicappers must answer when they try to predict the outcome of Saturday’s $282,925 New York Breeders’ Futurity at Finger Lakes.

ANDERSON, Ind. – Bob Baffert declined to quantify Lookin At Lucky’s readiness. It probably doesn’t matter. The colt seems good enough – even at less than 100 percent – to prevail in an otherwise nondescript field Saturday in the Indiana Derby at Hoosier Park. And the race is an obvious means to an end, a bridge to get Lookin At Lucky past his post-Haskell setback and to the Breeders’ Cup Classic in top shape.

ANDERSON, Ind. – They’ve had some good horses stroll around the seven-furlong oval at Hoosier Park. A Breeders’ Cup winner, Cash Run, had a race here, and the track’s signature event, the Indiana Derby, has been won by millionaires Perfect Drift, Brass Hat, Misremembered, and another Breeders’ Cup winner, Orientate.

But there will be a new level of equine prestige at Hoosier on Saturday, when Lookin At Lucky goes as a huge favorite in the 16th running of the Grade 2, $500,000 Indiana Derby. He will be the first winner of a Triple Crown event to run in the race.

Blind Luck has won five graded races from seven starts this year, including classics such as the Kentucky Oaks and Alabama. But on Saturday, the nation’s top 3-year-old filly could be facing the toughest fight of her fairy-tale season when she gives 10 pounds to budding rival Havre de Grace in the Grade 2, $750,000 Fitz Dixon Cotillion at Parx Racing in Bensalem, Pa.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Not that it is apparent in her undefeated 18-race career, but Zenyatta has a time of year when she may be better than ever, jockey Mike Smith insists.

The autumn, he said, seems to bring out the best in the wildly popular mare.

“She seems to get good at this time of year the last few years,” he said. “The way she’s going, she seems like she can do it again this year.”

STICKNEY, Ill. – The average winning time in the last seven editions of the Hawthorne Gold Cup has been 2:04.20 for 1 1/4 miles. The race is not for the fleet of foot but for the stout of heart and leg.

Morning-line favoritism in the race’s 2010 edition Saturday goes to rail-drawn Redding Colliery, whose top performances have come skipping along on a quick pace.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. – There was plenty of debate after the Del Mar Derby, owing to the antics of Twirling Candy and the decision by the stewards to leave him in first after a severe bumping incident five furlongs from the wire. Lost amid the controversy, though, was something everyone, in hindsight, could agree on, that Twirling Candy finished brilliantly, displaying the talent only the very special possess.

Simple Words, who has posted back-to-back triple-digit Beyer Speed Figures since arriving at Monmouth Park from Kentucky, steps up to face stakes company for the first time in the $75,000 Princeton Stakes for 3-year-old fillies.

After going 0 for 3 at Churchill Downs, Simple Words was sent to Monmouth in mid-July by trainer Steve Asmussen and soared to a 100 Beyer while cruising to a 9 3/4-length victory over maidens. She proved that was no fluke when she came back five weeks later to clear her first allowance condition, this time earning a 102 Beyer.

In the first two starts of her career, the 2-year-old filly Ima Wild Pussycat was anything but impressive, beaten a combined 21 lengths while earning mediocre Beyer Speed Figures of 31 and 49.

A dramatic change occurred when trainer Greg Sacco stretched out Ima Wild Pussycat around two turns, however. She romped by 7 1/4 lengths and soared to a 75 Beyer.

Ima Wild Pussycat will try and build upon that success and capitalize on her experience in a route when she faces six other 2-year-old fillies in Saturday’s $75,000 Blue Hen Stakes at Delaware Park.