COLLINSVILLE, Ill. - On the surface, Saturday's $30,000 Spend a Buck Stakes, a mile-and-70-yard race for 3-year-old colts and geldings at Fairmount Park, appears to contain a clear-cut favorite.

If you like raw speed, class, and ability to handle the prescribed distance, then you will like the Florida-bred gelding It's Lucky, the 5-2 morning-line favorite in a nine-horse field.

But looks can be deceiving, especially at Fairmount, and the Spend a Buck will pose a fine incubator for the unofficial "Fairmount Rules," also known as the Collinsville Curse:

Kristina's Wish is the kind of horse owners and trainers hope to walk away with when they make a claim. Taken for $10,000 at Oaklawn in April, she went on to win all four of her starts during the Lone Star Park meet and now makes her stakes debut in the $50,000 Margarita Breeders' Cup at Retama Park near San Antonio.

The 1 1/16-mile turf race for fillies and mares drew a full field of 12, including stakes winners Mexican Moonlight, Cherylville Slew, Lady Mallory, and Lady Sonya.

ALTOONA, Iowa - Vazandar leads a full field of 12 3-year-olds in the $50,000-added Iowa Stallion Stakes at Prairie Meadows.

Vazandar, a son of Demidoff, is the only open stakes winner entered in the mile-and-70-yard Stallion Stakes by virtue of his rallying two-length score in the $50,000 Come Summer Stakes at Canterbury Park on June 26.

Pat Day and David Carroll will be at Ellis Park on Saturday hoping to win the $100,000 Don Bernhardt Stakes with favored Fire Slam.

But if they don't win, well, there will be another day.

"We're using this race as a prep for the King's Bishop at Saratoga," said Carroll. "That's our goal this summer."

Dubleo, who crushed seven opponents in his first try on turf two weeks ago, looms a heavy favorite in the $50,000 Chenery, a five-furlong grass race for 2-year-olds at Colonial Downs.

The 75 Beyer Dubleo earned for his eight-length win against first-level allowance runners July 10 is 25 points higher than the next-best turf figure among his eight opponents.

Docent nipped Presidentialaffair by a nose and a neck when they faced each other in restricted stakes last fall and this June. Presidentialaffair, however, was clearly the better horse when they last met, racing in open company over a sloppy track, and in a graded stakes last November.

The rivalry resumes in the $50,000 Iroquois Handicap, a 1 1/16-mile race for Pennsylvania-breds at Philadelphia Park.

Six of the seven older sprinters in Saturday's $100,000 Vincent Moscarelli Memorial Handicap at Delaware Park have earned a Beyer Speed Figure between 101 and 106 in at least one of their last two starts.

Although that might indicate the six-furlong Moscarelli shapes up as a highly competitive race, the reality is that Don Six has the potential to dominate.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - In his usual understated way, trainer Dave Forster referred to winning both stakes races last Sunday at Hastings as "not a bad day at the office."

Forster sent out Treasured Friend to upset the top local 3-year-olds in the Jim Coleman Province, and also saddled the first two finishers, Socorro County and Gold Accent, in the Nanaimo Stakes for 3-year-old fillies.

FORT ERIE, Ontario - David Cross Jr., the trainer of 1983 Kentucky Derby winner Sunny's Halo, came out of retirement this year and has seven horses in his barn at the Fort. He had packed it in in 2001 while competing in California.

Cross, a native of Victoria, B.C., has had a low profile since returning to work. He has saddled one winner from 11 starts - Caledonna, who won a $5,000 maiden claimer here June 29.

SASKATOON, Saskatchewan - A field of five fillies and mares compete in Saturday's $5,000 Mademoiselle Handicap, with Princess Briartic the logical choice in the one-mile event.

A stakes winner at Marquis Downs earlier in her career, Princess Briartic will be seeking her third straight victory and should be loose on the lead in the Mademoiselle.