ARCADIA, Calif. - Of the probable starters for Sunday's $250,000 Norfolk Breeders' Cup Stakes at the Oak Tree at Santa Anita meeting, only Spot the Diplomat is a two-time stakes winner. Yet Spot the Diplomat may turn out to be one of the longest shots in the projected field of seven.

While several Norfolk hopefuls have run in graded stakes, Spot the Diplomat has yet to try that level. His two stakes wins came in statebred races at Del Mar - the Graduation Stakes over 5 1/2 furlongs on July 26 and the I'm Smokin Stakes over six furlongs on Sept. 4.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Trainer Roger Attfield was weighing the options for his talented turf mare Noble Stella in his office here at Woodbine on Thursday morning.

"There's the E.P. Taylor here, the Dowager at Keeneland, and the Breeders' Cup," noted Attfield.

The Grade 1, $2 million E.P. Taylor, over 1 1/4 miles, and the $150,000 Dowager, at 1 1/2 miles, both will be run Oct. 22.

The Grade 1, $2 million Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Turf will be held at Churchill Downs on Nov. 4 and Noble Stella would have to be supplemented at a cost of $180,000.

It took Bright One about 10 weeks over the summer to go from an unknown first-time starter to one of the more exciting prospects of the so-called “second season,” which encompasses the major 3-year-old stakes run after the Triple Crown.

The time needed to determine whether Bright One is a potential candidate for American racing’s biggest prize, the Breeders’ Cup Classic, will be considerably shorter – the less than two minutes it will take him to complete the 1 1/16 miles of Saturday’s Grade 2, $500,000 Indiana Derby at Hoosier Park.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – When a race has a Grade 1 ranking and a $600,000 purse, the host track ought to be able to get a first-class lineup. And that seems to be just what Keeneland got when entries were taken for the Shadwell Turf Mile, which anchors a sensational 10-race Saturday card.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Perhaps the weight spread will get . Perhaps one of his rivals will jump up with the race of his life. It might happen. But as Lava Man prepared for the Grade 2, $500,000 Goodwood Breeders’ Cup Handicap on Saturday at Santa Anita’s Oak Tree meeting, there was no indication that the year-long campaign he has waged has taken any toll on him.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Essential Edge will try to duplicate her scintillating Ontario Colleen Stakes score Saturday at Woodbine in the $150,000 Carotene, a nine-furlong turf stakes for Ontario-foaled 3-year-old fillies.

A royally bred daughter of Storm Cat, Essential Edge crushed maidens on the main track in her June 14 seasonal bow. After running third in the Bison City Stakes at Fort Erie, she finished third in the allowance prep for the Ontario Colleen.

Trainer Eric Coatrieux said Essential Edge ran greenly in the Colleen prep.

EDMONTON, Alberta - Hail to Dawn had an easy time of it when she dismantled a field of Alberta-breds last month in the Sturgeon River, but things are going to get significantly tougher for her in Saturday's $50,000 Freedom of the City here at Northlands Park.

Golden Pursuit, who has won his last three races by a combined total of one length, again looks like the horse to beat on Saturday when he faces six rivals in the $25,000 claiming feature at Hastings in Vancouver, British Columbia.

All of Golden Pursuit's recent victories have come over the 1 1/16-mile distance of Saturday's headliner, and he is returning to the $25,000 range following a $32,000 optional claiming/first-level allowance victory on Sept. 9.

ALBANY, Calif. - The only place other than turf that trainer Steve Specht would rather run Saturday's $75,000 Fort Mason at Golden Gate Fields would be on paper. The Specht-trained Bonfante, on paper at least, looks tough in the five-furlong turf race for Cal-breds.

Bonfante is the lone stakes winner in the field, and in his past two tries at the distance in northern California, he finished second to Exceeding in the $100,000 California Sprint Championship last September and won the same race when it was rescheduled this spring.

PHOENIX - Muir Beach, horse of the meet the last two seasons here, goes after career win No. 16 in Saturday's $40,000 City of Phoenix Stakes at Turf Paradise. Lined up against her in the six-furlong event is the scary Southern California shipper True and True. There are 12 fillies and mares in the field, but on paper it looks like a two-horse race.