MIAMI - Anybody searching for a Christmas miracle this year need only to walk into Barn 32 at Gulfstream Park and see Yvonne Azeff back working at her familiar post as assistant to trainer John Ward. She's back less than a year after suffering a head injury in a training-hours mishap that left her in a coma for nearly a month with bleak prospects for recovery.

ALBANY, Calif. - While Russell Baze was away, the rest of the Golden Gate Fields jockeys came out to play on Thursday.

Baze, the nation's leading rider with 429 victories and Golden Gate Fields's leader by 22 wins less than two months into the meet, rode at Santa Anita on Thursday.

With Baze gone, Kevin Krigger won four races at Golden Gate Fields, the highest single-day win total in his brief career. The four victories gave Krigger, who has ridden here for only one month, 15 for the meet and moved him into a tie for fifth in the jockey standings.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Minus a decent night of sleep, Julie Krone was buzzing through the Santa Anita stables on Friday morning, a day after she became the first woman rider to win a Grade 1 stakes in California, aboard Debonair Joe in the $200,000 Malibu Stakes.

The world's leading female rider, Krone has won numerous major stakes in her 20-year career. Still, she compared the win in the Malibu to her milestone victory in the

1993 Belmont Stakes, which gave her the distinction of becoming the first woman to ride the winner of a Triple Crown race.

ARCADIA, Calif. - The upset by Debonair Joe ($55.60) in Thursday's Malibu Stakes has led to a pick six carryover of $195,156 for Friday's eight-race program.

The pick six on Friday covers the third through eighth races.

In the third race, Heat Haze, a recent English import trained by Bobby Frankel, is the 5-2 morning-line favorite. She is a half-sister to Banks Hill, the 2001 Eclipse Award winner as outstanding turf female.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Debonair Joe pulled his second stakes upset of the month in Thursday's $200,000 Malibu Stakes, giving Hall of Fame jockey Julie Krone her first win at Santa Anita.

Debonair Joe ($55.60) ran seven furlongs in 1:22.40, closing from 10th on the backstretch to deny pacesetter Total Limit. American System, who fought with Total Limit for the lead throughout, finished third, a half-length behind the winner.

ARCADIA, Calif. - With four major stakes wins from coast to coast in the last 11 months, You has been a star 3-year-old filly for trainer Bobby Frankel.

She will start as the strong favorite in Saturday's $200,000 La Brea Stakes at Santa Anita, the final race of her remarkable season.

"She's had a hard year," Frankel said. "This is her last start until the spring."

ARCADIA, Calif. - Peace Rules is certain to be favored when he tries for his second consecutive stakes win in Saturday's $75,000 Hill Rise Stakes on turf at Santa Anita.

Coming off a front-running win in the $200,000 Generous Stakes at Hollywood Park on Nov. 30, Peace Rules is a standout in the one-mile Hill Rise, in which he faces six rivals.

MIAMI - Asked to name a Jonathan Sheppard-trained long-distance handicap star, most people would think of With Anticipation. But Sheppard has another long-winded stakes winner in his barn - Rochester, possibly the one to beat in Saturday's wide-open W.L. McKnight Handicap Saturday at Calder.

The Grade 2, $200,000 McKnight is one of four handicaps on the Grand Slam II card. The others are the Grade 2, $200,000 La Prevoyante, the Grade 3, $100,000 Fred Hooper Jr., and the $100,000 Stage Door Betty.

NEW ORLEANS - They've traveled from afar to reach Fair Grounds by Saturday for the $100,000 Woodchopper Handicap, the last turf stakes restricted to 3-year-olds, but none has journeyed longer than Better Talk Now. Yet his 20-hour van ride from Maryland earlier this week can't compare with his terrible trips this summer.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Trainer Bruce Levine admits he is feeling pressure heading into Saturday's Grade 3 Gallant Fox Handicap at Aqueduct with Coyote Lakes seeking his third consecutive victory in the 13-furlong marathon.

"I go over him every day," Levine said. "I had a bunch of sick horses in the barn, but he seems all right. Trying to win this race three times in a row, I feel it. I never felt it before."