Saturday's $75,000-added City of Las Cruces Handicap brings together a field of nine statebred fillies and mares at one mile. The likely favorite is Dancing Capote, but she is beatable and the race does offer value elsewhere.

Dancing Capote, a 5-year-old mare owned by Joe Dee and Lisa Brooks, enters the Las Cruces following two straight wins. She posted a mild upset last time out in her first attempt at a route. Prior to the start of her winning streak, she had won only two of her first 15 career starts.

A couple of horses who skipped out on the frigid Chicago weather are among a handful of contenders in the $40,000 Ides of March Stakes, the Saturday feature at Hawthorne Race Course in Stickney, Ill.

Tommy Cat, recently back from a winter in south Florida, and Fighting Indians, who wintered in Louisiana, could vie for favoritism in a well-matched field of seven in the Ides of March, a 1 1/16-mile race carded as the eighth of nine races.

Fuse It has been eating like a horse, and that's bad news for the six fillies and mares she will face Saturday night when she shoots for her third straight stakes win in the $50,000 Azalea for statebreds at Delta Downs in Vinton, La.

"She's in the feed trough real good," said Samuel Breaux, who trains Fuse It. "She loves to eat, and whenever she's eating good, she's running good."

ALBANY, Calif. - Five stakes winners head the field of seven 3-year-old fillies for Saturday's $75,000-added California Oaks at Golden Gate Fields.

Lucky Sabre and Maddie's Charm have won one-mile stakes races at the meeting. Amber Hills won a stakes at the distance as a 2-year-old.

Tale of a Dream and Viansa Ossidiana, both stakes winners sprinting at Bay Meadows, are also entered. Tale of a Dream ran second to Maddie's Charm in the one-mile Corte Madera Stakes on Dec. 28 and second to Lucky Sabre in the one-mile Vallejo on Feb. 15.

NORTH RANDALL, Ohio - Thistledown begins its 187-day racing season on Saturday, and will partner again with Beulah Park in a 7&7 racing format. The two tracks alternate their live races, with each track carding seven races a day. The season will be divided into four meetings: the 21-day Summit, the 50-day Thistledown, the 47-day Randall, and the 48-day Cranwood meet.

P Day and Full Brush, a pair of 8-year-olds who seem to show up just about any time Laurel Park runs a high-class two-turn race for older horses, are back yet again for Saturday's $75,000 Harrison E. Johnson Memorial Handicap.

It's two other grizzled veterans, however, one a fresh face and the other a runner quite familiar to Maryland fans, who could make the biggest impact in the 1 1/8-mile stakes race.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Will Ivanavinalot run in Friday's $200,000 Bonnie Miss Stakes at Gulfstream? Or will she ship to Florida Downs, where she would be a big favorite to win Sunday's $150,000 Florida Oaks?

That was the major question when entries closed Wednesday for the 1 1/8-mile Bonnie Miss with a field of eight 3-year-old fillies, including Ivanavinalot, who figures to be the odds-on favorite if she starts.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - With undefeated champion Storm Flag Flying bypassing Friday's $100,000 Stonerside Forward Gal Stakes, the Grade 3 race drew an evenly matched field of eight 3-year-old fillies.

House Party, Chimichurri, and Glorious Miss - the top three finishers from the Old Hat Stakes run here on Feb. 2 - top the field. Allowance winners City Fire, Fast Cookie, and Bella Lauren, as well as Final Round and Midnight Cry, add depth to the field.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Three weeks later than expected, Steelaninch makes his American debut in Friday's $75,000 Academy Road Stakes at Santa Anita.

He was entered for the Baldwin Stakes on the hillside turf course on Feb. 23, but was left out of the field when the race oversubscribed. The next option is the Academy Road Stakes, run at a mile for 3-year-olds.

ALBANY, Calif. - Because of concerns about the weather, the status of many of the potential runners for Sunday's Grade 3, $150,000 Golden Gate Breeders' Cup Handicap remains in limbo.

All eyes are on weather reports that indicate a severe storm is coming this weekend. The storm is supposed to hit Friday when entries to the turf race are taken.

Stakes coordinator Grant Baker said the race would come off the turf only "if management and jockeys believed the turf was unsafe." He said the graded status of the race could be affected by a switch to the turf.