Another Mystery’s narrow win over favored Pixelate on Nov. 27 in the Bob Wright Memorial Stakes continued a family fondness for the Fair Grounds grass course.

Trainer Michelle Lovell last week expressed amazement that her stable, numbering roughly 20 horses, had managed to knock out eight stakes wins during 2021.

Days later, the stakes tally had grown to 10 after stable stars Just Might won at Fair Grounds and Change of Control at Aqueduct.

Just Might, notching his sixth stakes victory this calendar year, coasted to a front-running 2 1/2-length win in the $150,000 Thanksgiving Classic, a six-furlong dirt sprint, with Colby Hernandez easing up on his mount through the final half-furlong.

Mandaloun, one of the better 3-year-olds of 2021, had his first published workout following a break from racing when he went an easy three furlongs Sunday at Churchill Downs.

Both Mandaloun and Knicks Go, sure to be named Horse of the Year for 2021, will roll into Fair Grounds sometime next week, when trainer Brad Cox sends a final shipment of horses south from Churchill to New Orleans.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Desert Dawn, third in the Grade 2 Chandelier Stakes at Santa Anita in October and sixth in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies on Nov. 5 at Del Mar, will be ridden by Mike Smith in Saturday’s Grade 1 Starlet Stakes at Los Alamitos.

Smith worked Desert Dawn five furlongs in 1:00.60 on Saturday at Del Mar. The decision to give Smith the mount was made after the BC Juvenile Fillies, in which Desert Dawn finished 18 3/4 lengths behind the brilliant winner, Echo Zulu. Ricky Gonzalez rode Desert Dawn in her first four starts.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario – Trainer Danny Vella was forced to scratch Coronation Futurity winner The Minkster from Sunday’s Grade 3 Grey at Woodbine, hindering the unbeaten Ontario-bred’s chances for Canadian champion male 2-year-old honors.

“He had a stall accident,” Vella said. “Somebody claimed a horse that got rowdy in the barn and upset him there the other day and he kicked the wall. He’ll be fine. It’s a shame, because if he [won the Grey], he’s champion 2-year-old.”

DEL MAR, Calif. – John Velazquez, the Hall of Fame rider, will be switching coasts this winter, as he will be based for the first time at Santa Anita after spending most of his previous winters in South Florida.

Velazquez on Sunday at Del Mar said the only thing holding him back was finding suitable housing, but by Monday morning that had been resolved, according to his agent, Ron Anderson.

Steve Asmussen and Tyler Gaffalione were in familiar positions atop the trainer and jockey standings when Churchill Downs wrapped up its 21-day, dirt-only meet Sunday.

Asmussen, with 20 winners at the meet, which began Oct. 31, extended his own Churchill record for most meet titles to 25. Gaffalione rode 34 winners, marking the sixth straight meet he has been the leading jockey at Churchill, dating to the 2020 spring meet. M and M Racing, with four wins, was the leading owner.

It’s been 10 years since Turfway Park ran its traditional stakes schedule. It’ll be one more before fans can be on hand to watch all the action at the Florence, Ky., track.

Turfway begins four months of winter action over Tapeta with an eight-race card Thursday evening. First post is 6:15 p.m. Eastern.

Invariably, it happens. A trainer or jockey is barely shy of a major milestone, and suddenly they can’t find the winner’s circle.

Gerald Bennett, the leading trainer at Tampa Bay Downs, is still three shy of becoming just the 14th trainer in North American racing history to win 4,000 races after going winless with his 13 starters during the first three days of the Tampa meet. Only one of those, however, was the post-time favorite.

Trainer John Sadler has been fined $5,000 by the California Horse Racing Board after Flagstaff tested positive for the banned medication clodronic acid, a bisphosphonate, following the Grade 2 Santa Anita Sprint Championship in September 2020.

The penalty was part of a settlement agreement with the racing board and was announced in a ruling issued on Friday by Del Mar stewards Grant Baker, Luis Jauregui and Kim Sawyer. The ruling cited that Sadler “knowingly brought a horse into (a) CHRB enclosure that had been administered bisphosphonates within previous six months.”