Finger Lakes will retain the same stakes schedule as last season when it opens for its 49th season on April 16.
The track in western New York will offer 17 stakes worth a collective $1.2 million, identical to 2009.
As usual, the highlights will be the $200,000 New York Breeders' Futurity for statebred 2-year-olds on Oct. 2 and the 38th running of the $150,000 New York Derby on July 17.
NEW ORLEANS - Rachel Alexandra schooled in the Fair Grounds paddock on Saturday, arriving with the entrants for the seventh race, and remaining during and after the seventh race was run.
She appeared calm as she was led around the paddock by Scott Blasi, assistant to trainer Steve Asmussen.
Steve Asmussen watched the schooling, and stood with Rachel Alexandra in the saddling stalls into which she was led at varying times.
"She was relaxed for her not having run in six months," said Asmussen.
NEW ORLEANS - One of trainer Greg Foley's entries has a mind of her own, and the other hasn't shown any love for the turf.
Still you have to like Foley's chances when he sends out uncoupled stablemates Valentine Fever and She's Extreme in Monday's featured ninth race, a third-level optional $62,500 claimer scheduled for 5 1/2 furlongs on the Fair Grounds turf.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Westover Wildcat, the 2-5 morning-line favorite for Saturday's $65,000 Fred 'Cappy" Capossela Stakes at Aqueduct, was scratched from the race due to a problem with his right front foot, trainer Tony Dutrow said Saturday.
"We're led to believe he has some type of foot problem, an abscess, or infection, something's going on," Dutrow said by phone from Pennsylvania. "I got a phone call at 5:30 [Friday] night that he's lame. Can't run him."
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Jockey Corey Nakatani will ride Dublin in the Grade 2, $300,000 Rebel at Oaklawn next Saturday, said D. Wayne Lukas, who trains the horse. Nakatani, the meet's leading rider, will replace Terry Thompson, who was aboard Dublin when he finished second in the Grade 3 Southwest last month in his first start since November.
Lukas said the decision was made with William Mack and Robert Baker, who race Dublin, the winner of last year's Grade 1 Hopeful.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - Uh Oh Bango, the runner-up to Rule in the Grade 3, $750,000 Delta Jackpot in his last start Dec. 4, breezed at Oaklawn on Friday in preparation for next Saturday's Grade 2, $300,000 Rebel.
Others considered probable for the 1 1/16-mile Rebel include Grade 1 winners Noble's Promise and Dublin. Cardiff Giant, who breezed six furlongs in 1:17.20 here Friday, is also expected. A strong possible is Lookin At Lucky, the champion 2-year-old of 2009.
HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - A month after trainer Tim Ice split with owners K.K. and Vilasini Jayaraman and lost 25 horses, including champion Summer Bird, the rebuilding process is moving right along for his stable. Ice has picked up horses from three new clients, including Dr. Leonard Blach, co-owner of Kentucky Derby winner Mine that Bird, and John Ed Anthony, who raced the 1992 Preakness and Arkansas Derby winner, Pine Bluff.
"Things are good," Ice said Friday. "I'm definitely in high spirits. I like the way that things are coming around."
NEW ORLEANS - With Rachel Alexandra pointed to return in next Saturday's New Orleans Ladies, the race is shaping up as an intimate affair, with five fillies or mares likely to run.
Although the purse for the race is $200,000, the most of any ungraded stakes at Fair Grounds, most trainers aren't interested in competing against the 2009 Horse of the Year.
The $150,000 Sham Stakes was scheduled to be run at Santa Anita Saturday, but the race also was carded as Sunday's 10th race out of concern that Saturday's 11-race program will be washed out by expected rain.
The Sham Stakes was originally scheduled for Feb. 27, but was postponed to Saturday when wet weather led to the cancellation of the Feb. 27 program. As one of the track's leading preps for the $750,000 Santa Anita Derby on April 3, the Sham is a race that needs to be run this weekend to allow 3-year-olds to maintain schedules, track officials said.
Pending California Horse Racing Board approval, Hollywood Park will offer four days of racing for each of the first two weeks and last two weeks of its upcoming spring-summer meeting, according to track officials.
The season, which runs from April 21 to July 18, will have a different schedule during the four-day weeks than in past seasons. The track plans to run on Wednesdays, offer only simulcasting on Thursdays and no live racing, and then run from Fridays through Sundays. That schedule will be in effect for the weeks of April 21-25, April 28-May 2, July 7-11 and July 14-18.
