Add another major 3-year-old dirt-route horse to what’s shaping up as a fantastic Haskell Invitational.

Trainer Steve Asmussen said Tuesday that Midnight Bourbon will make his next start July 17 at Monmouth in the Haskell. The other horses under serious consideration for the 1 1/8-mile fixture are Mandaloun, Hot Rod Charlie, Rombauer, Following Sea, Antigravity, and Pickin’ Time.

A pair of California invaders, Grade 1 winner Ce Ce and the versatile Laura’s Light top a field of eight older fillies and mares entered Wednesday for Saturday’s $350,000 Princess Rooney Invitational at Gulfstream Park. The Grade 2 Princess Rooney, a Win and You're In for the Breeders' Cup Fillyand Mare Sprint, highlights the Summit of Speed program that also includes the Grade 3, $200,000 Smile Sprint.

Keeneland Race Course on Wednesday released the stakes schedule for its 17-day fall meet in October with a projection of record purses amid a number of tweaks from the status quo.

The opening FallStars Weekend (Oct. 8-10), a huge weekend of preps toward the Breeders’ Cup, is essentially the same, except for Shadwell Farm dropping its sponsorship of the Grade 1 Keeneland Turf Mile. The $750,000 purse remains the same as during the 2020 pandemic year, whereas all other FallStars races have been restored to 2019 levels. The Shadwell Turf Mile had been worth $1 million from 2014-19.

Fulsome and O Besos both had their final pre-race works toward the Indiana Derby in separate early morning breezes this week at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky.

Fulsome went five furlongs in 1:00.80 on Wednesday, some 24 hours after O Besos went in 1:00.40 on Tuesday. They figure as the favorites when rematched next Wednesday in the 27th running of the Grade 3, $300,000 Indiana Derby at Indiana Grand in suburban Indianapolis.

RUIDOSO DOWNS, N.M. – On a recent weekend, there was widespread evidence a normal summer was under way at Ruidoso Downs.

With free general admission, the grandstand and box-seat areas were packed with racing fans from not only southern New Mexico but throughout West Texas, tourists escaping a late spring heat wave for cooler temperatures at 7,100 feet.

Storm the Court, the champion 2-year-old male of 2019, will not race again this year.

Trainer Peter Eurton said over the weekend that Storm the Court has been turned out on a central California farm and will return to the track for a 5-year-old campaign in 2022.

“We’re giving him a couple of months off to get him ready for next year,” Eurton said.

Eurton said this is Storm the Court’s first vacation.

“He hasn’t been off the track,” he said.

Big City Lights and Bochombo, the first two finishers of the $100,000 Fasig-Tipton Futurity on June 20 at Santa Anita, may meet again in the Grade 2 Best Pal Stakes at six furlongs on Aug. 7 at Del Mar.

Big City Lights, owned by William Peeples, won the Fasig-Tipton Futurity by 7 1/4 lengths in his stakes debut. Unbeaten in two starts, Big City Lights is trained by Luis Mendez.

CYPRESS, Calif. – Jockeys Alexis Centeno and Trevor McCarthy escaped injury on Sunday after being involved in a two-horse spill shortly after the start of the fourth race at Los Alamitos.

The riders were briefly hospitalized for tests late Sunday afternoon and were released at about 6 p.m. Both are expected to resume riding Friday, the next day of racing at Los Alamitos.

The incident occurred in a five-furlong maiden special weight race for 2-year-olds.

Not much at Emerald Downs gets past Joe Withee, who has been the director of publicity at the Auburn, Wash., oval since the track opened in 1996. However, he was taken by surprise when prior to the races on Sunday he was led to the winner’s enclosure where he was inducted into the Washington Horse Racing Hall of Fame.

“I had no idea,” Withee said. “I am part of the committee that selects nominees for the Hall of Fame, so they really put one past me.”

Withee was first exposed to horse racing by his father.

The 31-day summer meet at Ellis Park in western Kentucky got started Sunday amid sultry weather and with a pair of trainers, Eric Foster and Brad Cox, both winning back-to-back races. Foster, based at Ellis for much of the year, won races 2 and 3, and Cox went next in races 4 and 5.

“Family and friends who don’t always get to go to the races were here,” Foster said. “That makes winning that much better.”