The $600,000 WinStar Derby on March 16 will be the richest race of the 77-date Sunland Park meet, which opens on Dec. 12. The season will run through April 22, 2008. It will feature racing for both Thoroughbreds and Quarter Horses.

The WinStar is one of 29 stakes scheduled for Thoroughbreds. A 1 1/8-mile race, it will share a Sunday card with three other stakes: the $200,000 Sunland Park Oaks at 1 1/16 miles; the $150,000 Harry W. Henson Breeders' Cup Handicap for fillies and mares at one mile; and the $100,000 New Mexico Breeders' Derby at one mile.

ELMONT, N.Y. - Heavy rains that caused flooding on the backstretch and on major roads near the track prompted Belmont Park officials to cancel Wednesday's live racing card. The track was also closed for simulcasting, though fans could wager on other tracks through the New York Racing Association's telebet and Internet services.

Heavy rain fell swiftly during training hours Monday morning, forcing officials to close the track for training at 8:30. The track had been open during the storms and absorbed a tremendous amount of water.

DEL MAR, Calif. - Like the steady lapping of waves only furlongs away, relative calmness returned to Del Mar on Tuesday morning, one day after trainers expressed concern that the track's new Polytrack surface was much harder on Monday than it had been on previous days. But a decision to have a mid-morning renovation break, and a delay in reopening the track for training, resulted in a dangerous situation in the six-furlong chute that played a role in an accident that injured former jockey Alan Patterson, who is now an exercise rider.

AUBURN, Wash. - Trainer Doris Harwood has felt that Smarty Deb is a filly of high quality since she began working with her last fall, in part because she never made any mistakes.

Smarty Deb made a significant mistake in Sunday's six-furlong Angie C. Stakes for 2-year-old fillies, breaking dead last in a field of eight, but the fact that she overcame it seemed to validate her trainer's opinion.

Smarty Deb's gate problems began when she was reluctant to load, leaving the gate crew with few options but to pack her into the gate by brute force.

OMAHA, Neb. - Horsemen's Park fires up for a four-day festival of racing on Thursday as the track celebrates its 10th year of bringing live racing back to Omaha, Nebraska's largest city.

MIAMI - Mission accomplished.

That's how trainer Bill Kaplan would sum up Imawildandcrazyguy's 3 3/4-length allowance win here Saturday, the first victory for the gelding during a 3-year-old campaign that had seen him run fourth in the Kentucky Derby and sixth in the Belmont Stakes.

Trainer Howard Scarberry is starting to think Breeders' Cup with Silent Pleasure, who picked up his fifth stakes win of the year Saturday in the $125,000 Tiznow at Louisiana Downs. Scarberry said he would like to point Silent Pleasure for the new $1 million Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile at Monmouth Park on Oct. 26.

ELMONT, N.Y. - Rags to Riches will pass Saturday's $300,000 Coaching Club American Oaks after spiking a fever, but the favorite for the Grade 1 race may come out of the same barn.

On Tuesday, trainer Todd Pletcher reported that of his five other nominees, "very likely Octave is the one most likely to run."

After running second in five consecutive stakes, including the Kentucky Oaks behind Rags to Riches, Octave broke through with a Grade 1 win in the Mother Goose on June 30, in which she edged a stubborn Lady Joanne after a long drive.

A full and competitive field befitting a $1 million purse has been entered for Saturday's Virginia Derby, the Grade 2 turf race that anchors the richest program of the Colonial Downs meet.

Many of the top 3-year-old turf runners in North America are among the field of 10 entered in the Virginia Derby, including the top finishers in several key races of recent weeks.

DEL MAR, Calif. - At the grand age of 32, Jose Valdivia Jr. has watched the jockeys' room in Southern California change around him in recent months.

"I feel like I'm old," he said recently. "There are so many young riders."

Yes, young fellows such as Michael Baze, 20, and Joe Talamo, 17, finished one-two in the jockeys standings at the Hollywood Park spring-summer meeting, well ahead of Valdivia, who finished sixth with 30 wins.