OMAHA, Neb. - It's festival time in Omaha once again, as Horsemen's Park opens Thursday for a four-day stand that has come to be known as the Summer Festival of Racing.

AUBURN, Wash. - Trainer Bill Tollett's magical meeting at Emerald Downs continued on Sunday when Judicature, a maiden who went off at better than 20-1, won the $40,000 Angie C. Stakes for 2-year-old fillies by nearly three lengths in a sprightly 1:09.60 for six furlongs.

DEL MAR, Calif. - The resort atmosphere of Del Mar is fine for vacationing tourists, but handicappers and horsemen will not be satisfied until they cash a bet or win a race when the 43-day summer racing season begins Wednesday.

If there is an opening-day lock, it might be Porto Santo. A listed stakes winner in France, he makes his U.S. debut for trainer Julio Canani in race 8, the stronger division of the Oceanside Stakes for 3-year-olds at a mile on turf.

"His form is solid," said Canani. "He's been running with the best."

DEL MAR, Calif. - The best 2-year-old in the country emerged from last year's Del Mar meeting in Stevie Wonderboy, who won the Del Mar Futurity and later the Breeders' Cup Juvenile.

DEL MAR, Calif. - Del Mar offers a fresh start, as well as a fresh turf course. The grass has not been used here for 45 weeks, but it will get quite a workout over the next seven weeks.

After split divisions of the Oceanside Stakes on Wednesday, Del Mar will run two of its most important grass races of the meet this weekend, the Grade 1 Eddie Read and the Grade 1 John Mabee. On Monday, several horses pointing for those races were among the first 28 to work this meet over Del Mar's course.

Wednesday's opening day crowd at Del Mar will in some places resemble an audience at a sporting event, and in others a Mardi Gras gathering or a beach party. Sometimes, it will be all those things at once.

"Opening day is like spring break meets Royal Ascot," said horse owner Aron Wellman, 28.

The first of 43 days of racing at Del Mar is like no other event on the Southern California racing calendar. In a sport largely without seasons, Wednesday is an exception. There has been no live horse racing in the San Diego area since last September, when the 2005 meeting closed.

HENDERSON, Ky. - The damage could not have been much worse, but at least the timing wasn't bad. The tornado that tore through this region of western Kentucky and southwestern Indiana on Nov. 6 took its heaviest toll just three miles north of Ellis Park, killing 20 people in one trailer park alone and inflicting hundreds of millions of dollars in property loss throughout the area.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Churchill Downs wrapped up its 57-day spring meet Sunday with a slight increase in daily average handle. Daily average all-sources handle was $11.4 million, up slightly less than 1 percent from last year.

Total all-sources handle for the meet, which ran one week longer than usual, was $652.3 million, up 11.4 percent over corresponding figures for the 52-day spring meet in 2005.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - George Handy proved it is never too late to start over. A training legend in New England, Handy got back into the game on July 14, one day after his 83rd birthday.

"It was quite a happy day," Handy said. "It was good to start back in the business."

Handy won his first race in over a year when Vow got up to win for a $10,000 claiming tag at Monmouth Park. Handy claimed Vow for $7,500 with his own money June 30 after promises of horses to train all fell through.

For a filly who began her career in spectacular fashion, the last few months hardly could have unfolded any worse for Original Spin.

But trainer Tony Mitchell expects the 3-year-old season of Original Spin to start heading in the right direction Wednesday. Making her first start outside of stakes company since she captured a maiden race nearly a year ago, Original Spin figures as a solid favorite when she tries statebred allowance fillies in the co-featured seventh race at Arlington Park in Arlington Heights, Ill.