LEXINGTON, Ky. – Coolmore has done it before. Ten years after an Irish-bred filly named Together wheeled back on six days’ rest to win the Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup, the worldwide powerhouse stable will give it a go again Saturday.

The 3-year-old filly Empress Josephine, who was beaten just a length for all the money when third Saturday in the Grade 1 First Lady at Keeneland behind the older Chad Brown tandem of Blowout and Regal Glory, will run back a week later as one of the principals in the 38th running of the Grade 1, $500,000 QE II.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Preceding the Grade 2 Jessamine on an eight-race Wednesday card at Keeneland is an $88,000 allowance (race 7) in which Swiftsure will make his first start since finishing far back as the favorite six months ago in the Lexington Stakes.

“He caught a really nasty track in the Lexington and was really jammed up off it, so we gave him some time off afterward,” trainer Steve Asmussen said. “He’s a horse that showed a lot of potential his first two starts.”

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Alex Achard toiled away in anonymity, hoping that his day would come.

Finally, it did.

Achard was still aglow with joy Sunday, less than 24 hours after reaching a milestone he couldn’t be blamed for thinking might never occur. Achard registered the first Grade 1 win of his nascent riding career Saturday, giving a perfect ride to a 5-year-old Brazilian-bred gelding named In Love in a 12-1 upset of the richest race of the Keeneland fall meet, the $750,000 Keeneland Turf Mile.

ELMONT, N.Y. – Over the last three weekends, trainer Chad Brown has won seven graded stakes, run first and second in four of them, and has seen his potential roster for the Breeders’ Cup on Nov. 5-6 at Del Mar increase significantly.

C Z Rocket, one of California’s top sprinters for more than a year, will be pre-entered for the Breeders’ Cup Sprint and Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile to be run Nov. 6 at Del Mar, trainer Peter Miller said Sunday.

C Z Rocket was second in the 2020 BC Sprint at Keeneland, and that race will be a first preference next month, Miller said.

“We’re going to consider the Dirt Mile, but it will probably be the Sprint,” Miller said.

The leading races of the upcoming weekend at Santa Anita are $100,000 stakes for statebreds at about 6 1/2 furlongs on the hillside turf course, which is being used sparingly this month for the first time since spring 2019.

There were three sprint races on the hillside turf course from Oct. 1-3 after track management announced in September that sprints would be run on the course at the current autumn meeting, which continues through Oct. 31.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Charmaine’s Mia, a three-time stakes winner at Santa Anita earlier this year who has lost her last three races, will start in the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint on Nov. 6 at Del Mar, if she can gain a place in what is expected to be an oversubscribed field.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Owner-trainer Brandon Greer has called an audible with Woodbine Mile winner Town Cruise and is planning on sending the speedy 6-year-old to Del Mar for the Nov. 6 Breeders’ Cup Mile.

Right after wiring the field in the Grade 1 Woodbine Mile, a BC Win and You’re In qualifier, Greer said he wanted to put Town Cruise away for the year, but the gelding’s recent robust demeanor swayed him to change his mind. He nominated Town Cruise to Sunday’s Grade 2 Nearctic here, but said he’s heading to the BC Mile, to which he will have to be supplemented for $100,000.

ELMONT, N.Y. - While Following Sea earned a fees-paid berth into the $2 million Breeders’ Cup Sprint by winning Saturday’s Grade 2, $250,000 Vosburgh Stakes, trainer Todd Pletcher stopped short of committing him to that race.

Pletcher said he needs to have discussions with the principals of Spendthrift Farm, the owners of Following Sea, to see if they want to run in the Sprint. Jackie’s Warrior is expected to be the favorite for the Sprint, and Following Sea was beaten nine lengths by him in the Grade 1 H. Allen Jerkens at Saratoga on Aug. 28.

ELMONT, N.Y. - Trainer Christophe Clement said he is in no hurry to make a decision regarding a start in the Breeders’ Cup Turf for Gufo, who finished third in Saturday’s Grade 1 Joe Hirsch Stakes.

Clement was disappointed with the trip Gufo got in the Hirsch, believing that jockey Joel Rosario may have made a premature move toward the lead in the 1 1/2-mile race.

“With a better-timed ride, he would have finished second,” Clement said. “The jockey more or less agreed.”