SAN MATEO, Calif. - On the surface, the returning Broke in Blairsden seems like a pass in Thursday's Bay Meadows feature, a $50,000 optional claiming race at six furlongs.

The 6-year-old mare has not run since Aug. 22, and her career-best Beyer surpasses the career best of only one of her eight filly-mare rivals.

But numbers don't tell the whole story with Broke in Blairsden. She raced well against much better last year, and a repeat of any of her best efforts from 2003 would make her hard to beat Thursday.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Hall of Fame trainer Allen Jerkens has won six runnings of the race known as the Bed o' Roses Breeders' Cup Handicap. His first winner came in 1964 with the Hobeau Farm mare Beauful. His last winner came in 1998 with the 4-year-old Bohemia Stable filly Dixie Flag.

But in typical Jerkens style, he rues the one that got away. In 1974 - the year after he won the Bed o' Roses with the 3-year-old filly Poker Knight - Jerkens sold a filly named Klepto to Leon Hekimian for $15,000. She won that year's Bed o' Roses.

An agreement between Churchill Downs Inc. and the Louisiana Horsemen's Benevolent and Protective Association could pave the way for Churchill to acquire Fair Grounds, the embattled New Orleans racetrack. According to sources close to the negotiations, CDI would acquire the track for $45 million. But the prospective deal does not signal an imminent acquisition. Churchill and Fair Grounds, which is in bankruptcy, must reach an accord for the agreement to stick, with negotiations expected to intensify later this week.

Woodbine's 2004 Thoroughbred meeting is set to begin Saturday, with entries for the first of 167 cards to be drawn Thursday.

The opening is later than usual this year because of a $9 million construction project that included renovation of seven barns and the installation of sprinklers in most structures. There will be no change in the number of days raced, as the meeting will end on the relatively late date of Dec. 12.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - The last few grains of sand in the graded-earnings hourglass are about to fall. Not surprisingly, quite a few horsemen wanting to make the Kentucky Derby have spied the Coolmore Lexington Stakes as their final chance to beat that menacing deadline, and the result is a large prospective field for the Grade 2 race at Keeneland on Saturday.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - So much done, and so much to do. The 15-day Keeneland spring meet reaches the midpoint Wednesday with a lot of great racing in the books, and yet plenty of intense racing action still remains.

The $100,000 Appalachian Stakes on Wednesday helps start the week and one of the race favorites, Galloping Gal, already has done quite a bit in her nascent career. Yet trainer Ken McPeek believes the late-running filly has plenty yet to do, and is hoping she can begin running as well at 3 as she did at 2.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark - Oaklawn closed out its 100th anniversary season Saturday with increases in attendance, total ontrack handle, and purses.

Offtrack average daily handle on its races dropped after Oaklawn withheld its signal from some offshore sites whose clients employ high-speed computerized "batch" technology. Offsite handle on Oaklawn's races averaged $3,289,010, down 10 percent from $3,658,306 in 2003.

And average handle from all sources on Oaklawn's live races declined 7 percent, to $4.3 million a day.

Keeneland canceled the second of its two under-tack preview shows for its Tuesday 2-year-old auction after one of the juveniles broke down fatally after breezing Monday morning.

A Pulpit filly out of stakes winner Miss Nance broke down entering the turn after the wire. Her rider was uninjured, according to Jim Williams, a Keeneland spokesman, but the filly was euthanized.

CALGARY, Alberta - Trainer Floyd Arthur seeks to obtain immediate dividends from Shudabinajumper in Wednesday's featured seventh race at Stampede Park, which offers a $19,200 purse for older fillies and mares going six furlongs.

Arthur and rival trainer Dale Greenwood have engaged in a claiming war the past year, with Shudabinajumper, a 6-year-old mare, their center of attention.

Arthur claimed Shudabinajumper, a Washington-bred daughter of Flagman Ahead, for $28,000 on the opening day of this meet and runs her back for the same price against just five foes.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Trainer Darrell Vienna wishes he had a bit more time to prepare Icy Avenue for her comeback. Nonetheless, Icy Avenue returns from an 11-month break in a $56,000 allowance race at Santa Anita on Wednesday.

"This is a little early for her," Vienna said. "[Icy Avenue] is maybe one work short, but not so much that she doesn't have a chance."

Last spring, won consecutive allowance races over a mile on turf, racing against statebreds at Santa Anita and open company at Hollywood Park.