High winds have forced the cancellation of Friday racing at Philadelphia Park.

Due to unsafe track conditions, Friday's live racing at Turf Paradise has been cancelled.

Due to unsafe track conditions, Friday's live racing at Finger Lakes has been cancelled.

High winds forced NYRA to cancel racing at Aqueduct on Friday for the second consecutive day. The track will remain open for simulcast wagering.

Last year, trainer Scott Lake appeared to have the Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash at his mercy with Thunderello, who was coming off a terrific second-place finish in the Breeders' Cup Sprint.

Sent off the even-money favorite in the De Francis, Thunderello was pulled up after three furlongs were run over a sloppy track. The diagnosis was a fractured sesamoid and cracked splint bone, and Thunderello subsequently was retired.

Mark Hopkins was ready to give up. After A Huevo developed another in a long line of physical problems last year, Hopkins was resigned that he would never find out if the gelding was as good as he thought when he bought him in the summer of 1999.

But, last year, when Michael Dickinson offered to train A Huevo for free, Hopkins naturally agreed to let Dickinson try to bring the horse back. On Saturday, in the Grade 1, $300,000 Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash at Laurel Park, Hopkins will find out if it was all worth it.

Trainer Nick Zito has already had a tremendous fall with his 2-year-old colts, winning graded events such as the Champagne with Birdstone, Lane's End Breeders' Futurity with Eurosilver, and Iroquois with The Cliff's Edge.

Saturday, Zito will seek another juvenile graded stakes when he sends out Ghost Mountain in the Grade 3, $100,000 Laurel Futurity at Laurel Park. The Laurel Futurity is one of five supporting stakes on a 10-race card that features the Grade 1 Frank J. De Francis Memorial Dash.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Five of the last seven runnings of the Mrs. Revere Stakes at Churchill Downs have been decided by a neck. That is nothing more than a statistical aberration, but it can be partly explained by the fact that the Mrs. Revere tends to draw closely matched fields that result in heated competition.

MIAMI - Defending champion Best of the Rest is the horse to beat in Saturday's $200,000 Carl G. Rose Classic. The race gained meaning for Best of the Rest's trainer, Eddie Plesa Jr., when Best of the Rest's owner-breeder, Bernie Oxenberg, died just two weeks ago.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Smoocher and A Bit O'Gold, possibly the top two juveniles at Woodbine, will clash in Saturday's $135,625 Display Stakes, a 1 1/16-mile race, which will help determine the Sovereign Award for Canadian champion 2-year-old.

Smoocher has won 2 of his 3 starts, all under trainer David Bell. A Florida-bred, Smoocher graduated his second time out, in a quick maiden special weight race, and then captured the Grade 2 Grey Breeders' Cup Stakes with an inside rally over the best part of the track Oct. 5.