Tommy Panache heads a field of nine Ohio-bred 2-year-olds in the $40,000 Ohio Freshman Stakes at Beulah Park.

Tommy Panache is the only stakes winner entered in the mile and 70-yard Freshman and one of only three winners in the field.

In his career debut on Sept. 4, Tommy Panache stalked the pace to the stretch and rallied to score a three-quarters of a length victory in the six-furlong Loyalty Stakes at Thistledown. Tommy Panache's only other start came just more than a month later at Keeneland, when he finished ninth against allowance company.

An ESPN commentator, Jeannine Edwards, will be a special guest of Hoosier Park on Saturday when the Anderson, Ind., track offers its fifth annual Ladies Night, featuring the Female Jockey Challenge.

Edwards will host a handicapping seminar before the races and provide commentary and interviews from the winner's circle during the six-race series of challenge races. A dozen riders from the region will be competing in the challenge.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - Time could be running out for the 4-year-old filly Diavla in the $60,000 Honey Bee Stakes on Saturday night at The Meadowlands Racetrack.

The question of whether to race or breed Diavla next season is still unresolved for owners Bobby Hurley and Tom Perri. That adds a bit of urgency for trainer Kelly Breen.

"You try to win every race you run, but we're really trying to get a stakes win for her and I think she's got it in her," Breen said. "This is a perfect spot."

Bright Gold lost her last four starts in 2004 and her first race this season, perhaps an indication it was time to think about retirement for the 5-year-old mare. In search of a wake-up call, trainer Mary Eppler tried returning Bright Gold to the turf, even though the mare was 0 for 5 lifetime on the surface.

CHICAGO - A temporary disconnect late this week in Chicago: The calendar reads November, and the thermometer reads 70 degrees. It feels right that the Saturday feature at Hawthorne will be run on the grass course.

Surely with winter coming sometime, turf racing cannot be long for the circuit, but 10 fillies and mares were entered in the $40,000 Yo Tambien, a 1 1/16-mile grass race. It's a familiar bunch, too, horses that have faced each other time and time again in Chicago grass races the last couple seasons.

FORT ERIE, Ontario - The 104-day Fort Erie meet ended Tuesday with a gain in total handle despite a decrease in ontrack handle.

The total all-sources average daily handle of $913,998 was an increase of 11 percent from last year's average of $824,084 per day during a shortened 81-day meet.

Betting offtrack increased 18 percent, to $791,021 from $670,694 per day in 2004, primarily because the Fort Erie signal was taken this year in California and by New York City OTB. Ontrack wagering declined to $122,977, a 20 percent drop from $153,390 per day in 2004.

Ever since Suffolk Downs closed for two years in 1989, New England racing has steadily seen some of its most successful trainers head elsewhere for more money. It's refreshing when the prodigal sons and daughters return home with stakes horses, as Mike Gorham and Lori Lockhart will do in Saturday's $40,000 Amelia Peabody Stakes.

The Peabody is a race for Massachusetts-bred 2-year-old fillies at six furlongs. It was one of four races added to the stakes calendar here at the end of the season. In recent years it has attracted some of the best statebred runners.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - By the time the season ends, Justin Stein will have posted a record number of wins by an apprentice rider in a single season at Hastings - a record that will likely stand for a long time. He has 129 wins at the meet, and last weekend blew past Dave Wilson's old record of 123 wins, set in 1994.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Julia Carey, who recently celebrated her 20th anniversary as an employee in Woodbine's mutuels department, will be looking to punch out her biggest ticket ever here on Saturday afternoon.

But the cashing would come in Carey's other role, as a trainer of Thoroughbred racehorses, when she sends out Friendly Theresa for the $135,375 Ontario Fashion Handicap.

Carey, 52, added training to her resume about eight years ago, generally racing just a horse or two before adding a few more over the past couple of seasons.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Stevie Wonderboy, the winner of the Breeders' Cup Juvenile and the top candidate for the Eclipse Award as the champion 2-year-old, will not start again this year, trainer Doug O'Neill said on Wednesday.

Owned by Merv Griffin, Stevie Wonderboy will remain in light training in coming months and be pointed for the Kentucky Derby preps early next year. O'Neill envisions Stevie Wonderboy having "two or three" starts before the Kentucky Derby on May 6.