A West Virginia circuit court judge issued an order Thursday afternoon requiring Charles Town Races and Slots to give seven suspended jockeys access to the racetrack grounds.

STICKNEY, Ill. - The longtime New Orleans horseman Louie Roussel took a four-year break from training his horses, with assistant Lara Van Deren down as Roussel's trainer from 2004 to 2007. Back as trainer in 2008, Roussel, who won two-thirds of the Triple Crown co-owning and training Risen Star, got to the Kentucky Derby, where Recapturetheglory finished a respectable fifth.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Cawaja Beach, unbeaten and virtually untested in four starts last year for trainer and part-owner Scott Fairlie, had her campaign cut short last fall when she came up with a lesion on a tendon.

That left Milwaukee Appeal to carry the baton for the Fairlie stable in the 2-year-old filly ranks, and she responded well, with a second-place finish in the 1 1/16 mile Princess Elizabeth and a victory in the 1 1/16 mile Ontario Lassie.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - The decision by trainer Dale Greenwood and owner Danny Dion to leave Alberta and race at Hastings this year has already had a positive impact on racing here. In the first two days, they have entered seven horses.

Greenwood entered the Dion-owned pair of Bears Artiste and Broken Hearted in the seventh race on Sunday, a $75,000 optional claiming race. Without the two stakes-winning fillies, the race might not have been carded.

New York state will provide $250 million in financing to a developer willing to build and operate a casino at Aqueduct racetrack in Queens under a new set of bidding procedures announced on Friday.

The new procedures are intended to fast-track the Aqueduct casino project, which has been delayed for years by political and financial considerations surrounding the racing franchise held by Aqueduct's operator, the New York Racing Association, and by the collapse this year of a previous deal that had tabbed Delaware North Cos. to build the casino.

A West Virginia circuit court judge on Thursday issued a restraining order barring Charles Town Races from enforcing the suspension of seven riders who have been accused by the track of falsifying their riding weights.

Judge L. D. Engor of Kanawha County Circuit Court issued the order at the request of the Jockeys' Guild, the national organization that represents jockeys. Engor's order said that the notices sent to the jockeys about their rights to a hearing were "constitutionally insufficient" and that the track had violated the riders' due-process rights.

Calder Race Course and horsemen in Florida have reached a purse agreement for the upcoming season at the racetrack, which begins April 24 and runs through Jan. 2, 2010, officials for both sides announced on Thursday.

Last year the two sides failed to come to an agreement on purses until well into the 2008 meet. As a result, Calder's signal was blacked out of many out-of-state simulcasting locations until July and, separately, the signal was blocked from distribution to account-wagering companies until December.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - Looking at his resume, it is easy get the idea that the new director of racing at Hastings, Paul Ryneveld, has had a hard time holding down a job. This will be his seventh job in the racing industry since he graduated from the University of Arizona's Race Track Industry Program in 1995.

"I am hoping it's my last," said Ryneveld.

He started out in the Arizona Department of Racing before working at Sunland Park in New Mexico, Great Lakes Downs in Michigan, back to Sunland, then Emerald Downs and Fairplex.

Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Ark., bucked widespread national trends in racing by registering a 4.6 percent increase in average daily handle on its races during the 54-day meet that ended last Saturday, according to figures supplied by the racetrack.

Average daily handle was $3,576,914, compared with last year's average daily handle figure of $3,419,235, according to the figures. Overall, handle on Oaklawn's live races this year was $193,153,358, compared to $181,219,455 last year, an increase of 6.6 percent.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Afternoon Stroll won a head-bobbing finish before surviving an objection in a stunning upset of the Grade 3 Appalachian Stakes on a cool Thursday afternoon at Keeneland.

With Jamie Theriot riding, Afternoon Stroll returned $102.60 as the longest shot in a field of nine 3-year-old turf fillies after outnodding Hot Cha Cha on the wire. The Keeneland stewards quickly dismissed an objection by Kent Desormeaux, rider of fourth-place finisher Our Dahlia, for alleged interference.