A winner of five straight races before making a rare and unsuccessful attempt on the turf, Calista Ridge returns to her favorite surface as the starting highweight in Saturday night's $75,000 Matron Stakes at Evangeline Downs. She will join nine other fillies and mares in the one-mile race, the ninth of 10 races.

Live Thoroughbred racing returns to Indiana on Saturday as Hoosier Park in Anderson opens for its 12th season. The 61-day meet runs through Nov. 25.

As always, the highlight of the season comes on the first weekend in October when the track offers the Indiana Oaks and Indiana Derby on successive nights. The $500,000-added Indiana Derby is in its third year as a Grade 2 race and will be run Oct. 7.

With two wins, including one over the local course, Eldon's Effort might have a slight edge over a closely matched group of 2-year-olds Saturday night in the $100,000 El Joven at Retama Park.

The one-mile turf race is one of two stakes on the card for 2-year-olds. The other, the $100,000 La Senorita for fillies on the grass, goes as race 6 and opens a special pick four that includes both stakes.

Eldon's Effort made his last start at Retama, winning a 7 1/2-furlong allowance prep for the El Joven on Aug. 12.

A pair of unbeaten juveniles, Mischeviousfighter and Dorothy Hazel, head a field of 10 in Saturday's $30,000 Prairie Lily Sales Stakes, the richest race of the year here at Marquis Downs. The seven-furlong Prairie Lily is restricted to graduates of the 2005 Prairie Lily yearling sale.

Both Mischeviousfighter and Dorothy Hazel have 2-for-2 records and they should attract the bulk of the public's support.

Elite Mercedes goes for his fifth win in a row in Saturday's $40,000 R.J. Speers Stakes here at Assiniboia Downs. The R.J. Speers, a 1 1/16-mile race for 3-year-olds and upward, attracted a field of seven.

Trained by Emile Corbel, Elite Mercedes won the Wheat City Stakes last time out in his first local start. A 9-year-old gelding, Elite Mercedes was claimed for $15,000 three starts ago while racing at Churchill Downs.

Raggidy Rowe and Gus Again have also won stakes races here this season.

MIAMI - Trainer Steve DiMauro is on a roll, having won a pair of overnight stakes with older horses Darluna and Eternal Look at Calder last weekend. DiMauro is hoping the hot streak continues at Calder Saturday, when he sends out his undefeated and untested 2-year-old Straight Faced as the solid favorite in the $150,000 Affirmed Stakes, the middle leg of the open division of the Florida Stallion Stakes.

MIAMI - Under normal circumstances, Saturday's Juvenile Showcase at Calder would have featured an enticing matchup between undefeated 2-year-olds Straight Faced and Yesbyjimminy in the Affirmed Stakes. Unfortunately that meeting will have to wait until later in the meet.

CHICAGO - Horseplayers looking for playable prices might crave big fields. It's a different story for a horse trainer.

"I always have a better feeling when I have to beat five or six than when I have to beat 10 or 12," said trainer Dave Vance.

The Vance-trained Maggie Slew has only to beat five to win Saturday's 1 1/8-mile Arlington Matron Handicap, and though Maggie Slew is a 3-year-old facing older horses, she beat eight of nine older rivals - finishing behind only favored Prospective Saint - in the Aug. 5 Gardenia Handicap at Ellis Park.

The 14th year has been a charmed one for Eddie Kenneally. An Irish native who began his North American training career in 1993 with one win from nine starters, Kenneally has steadily upgraded his stable and is enjoying his finest year by far, largely on the strength of what his standout 3-year-old filly Bushfire has accomplished.

Golden Gate Fields is planning to install a synthetic surface immediately after it runs the January-June meeting it is requesting for next year.

Construction of a new track from the bottom up would take a minimum of three months, said the track's general manager, Robert Hartman said.

"We would have to do the construction and also mix the surface," Hartman said. "The mixing should not be done when it is wet to get the best possible result. When it's wet when you try to mix, it doesn't work as well.