Laurel Park will run the same 19 stakes as last year during its winter meet that begins Jan. 1.

As usual, the showcase events will be a pair of Grade 2, seven-furlong sprints on President's Day weekend - the Barbara Fritchie Breeders' Cup Handicap for fillies and mares on Saturday, Feb. 17, and the General George BC Handicap for older males two days later. Both stakes carry the same $300,000 as last year.

The remaining 17 stakes received across-the-board $15,000 purse increases, which includes bonus money from the Maryland Million Ltd. and Maryland-bred fund.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - The abrupt shift to the inner track at Aqueduct won't hurt Spooky Mulder's chances Sunday in the featured $49,000 allowance optional claimer.

When the Thursday forecast called for heavy showers, the Big A moved the Friday, Saturday, and Sunday cards to the inner strip as a precaution to preserve the weather-battered main track.

Conditions permitting, main-track racing returns on Wednesday.

In the interlude, Spooky Mulder winds up on the winterized strip where he has a record of 4-2-0 in 8 starts.

MIAMI - Anybody looking to get an early jump on handicapping the $50,000 King George's Wrong Way II Stakes on next Saturday's Extreme Day program should have been at Calder during training hours on Friday morning when three potential starters for the race turned in recorded workouts going clockwise over the turf course.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Trainer John Kimmel said Friday that Premium Tap "is in the 50-50 range" to ship from New York for the Clark Handicap, the Grade 1 race that helps close out the Churchill Downs fall meet with its 132nd running Friday.

Premium Tap finished third behind Invasor and Bernardini in the Nov. 4 Breeders' Cup Classic and thus figures as a logical favorite in the $500,000 Clark. Kimmel said the colt was scheduled to breeze Saturday at Belmont Park, "and we'll probably make a decision by Monday on whether or not we'll be coming."

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Regardless of how he does in Sunday's $125,000 Kennedy Road Stakes, Judiths Wild Rush has probably already locked up the Sovereign Award for Canadian champion sprinter, an honor he won last year.

Judiths Wild Rush was competitive in several American graded stakes this year, which has given him the upper hand on Woodbine's other leading sprinters, who have taken turns beating each other.

PORTLAND, Ore. - Ex Mountain Cop will attempt to make it three stakes wins in a row when he takes on seven other 2-year-olds at Portland Meadows in Sunday's $20,000 Columbia River Stakes at six furlongs.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - Stephanson will try to win his third straight race at Hastings when he takes on Mountain Musician in an allowance race for 2-year-olds that haven't won a stakes race. The 6 1/2-furlong feature attracted 11 horses and goes as the seventh race.

Nobiz Like Shobiz, who would have been a top contender in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile but did not run, was one of 18 horses pre-entered Wednesday in the Grade 3, $1 million Delta Jackpot. The 1 1/16-mile race for 2-year-olds will be run at Delta Downs on Dec. 1.

Costa Rising is returning to the Louisiana-bred ranks for Saturday night's $100,000 Gold Cup at Delta Downs, and although he won six straight statebred races between April and August, he finds himself in the unusual position of having questions to answer heading into the 1 1/16-mile race. Costa Rising is returning on short rest, he comes into the race off two rare defeats, and he is making his first start over the six-furlong track at Delta.

"There are questions we just can't answer until we run," said Charles Castille Jr., who owns Costa Rising.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Tinseltown, in peak career form, bids for his first open stakes victory in the Grade 3, $100,000 Stuyvesant Handicap Saturday at Aqueduct.

A 4-year-old colt trained by Jimmy Jerkens, Tinseltown faces six rivals in the 1 1/8-mile race, which has been shifted from the main track to the inner track. With heavy rain in the forecast, the Big A moved the Friday, Saturday, and Sunday cards from the main track to the inner to avoid problems like those that resulted in a cancellation on Nov. 9.