PORTLAND, Ore. ? Stareaux, who closed smartly for third when she last raced in the six-furlong Diane Kem Handicap here Nov. 10, heads a field of seven older fillies and mares in Sunday's six-furlong allowance feature at Portland Meadows.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Vindication, the early favorite for the Kentucky Derby, will have his next workout delayed after the colt put in a blazing move on Jan. 25, trainer Bob Baffert said Friday at Santa Anita.

Vindication worked a bullet five furlongs in 58.40 seconds, his fifth workout since he resumed serious training in late December. "He breezed so fast the other day, I might give him nine or 10 days," Baffert said. "He's done that before; we've given him a lot of time between works."

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - Trainer Todd Pletcher hopes Sunday's $100,000 Old Hat Stakes at Gulfstream Park will be a launching pad to bigger and better things for Chimichurri in 2003. A graded stakes winner at 2, Chimichurri opens her 3-year-old campaign against six other fillies in the six-furlong Old Hat.

Chimichurri, a daughter of Elusive Quality, closed out her 2-year-old season with a 1 1/4-length victory in Aqueduct's Grade 3 Tempted Stakes at a mile. It was her third win from her last four starts (she was third over a sloppy track in the Grade 2 Astarita).

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - A week after freezing temperatures forced the cancellation of the first three days of the meet, Oaklawn Park opened on Friday to a crowd of 14,794. Double-digit winners ruled the first half of the program, and skies were sunny and temperatures were in the 50's.

In the featured $50,000 Dixie Belle for 3-year-old fillies, Explosive Beauty, wearing blinkers for the first time, powered to a 6 1/4-length win over Hannah's Royalrock. It was another 4 3/4 lengths back in third to Mekko Hokte.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. - The $50,000 Mountain Valley did not fill for Sunday, but that doesn't mean there is a shortage of 3-year-olds at this Oaklawn Park meet. A number of promising colts are pointing for the $75,000 Southwest Stakes later in the meet, among them Great Notion, Sir Cherokee, and Comic Truth.

The last time the six-furlong Mountain Valley was not run was 1947. In its place, the Sunday feature will be a one-mile conditioned allowance race that drew Windward Passage, who won last year's Grade 3 Rebel at Oaklawn.

MIAMI - Buoyed by the success of its 2002 stakes season, Calder Race Course has upped the ante for the 2003 Calder and Tropical meetings, both of which will offer record total stakes purses.

The 128-day Calder meet begins on April 25 and will feature $5.7 million in stakes topped by the $1.7 million Summit of Speed July 12 and the $1.55 million Festival of the Sun Oct. 11.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - There is no stakes race for handicap males in New York during the month of February. Sunday's $56,000 allowance race, called the King's Swan, fits the bill nicely.

Aqueduct inner-track lovers Coyote Lakes and Ground Storm head a strong field of seven set to contest nine furlongs in a race that could serve as a prep for next month's $75,000 Stymie Handicap.

NEW ORLEANS - Delta Downs stewards confirmed Friday that they and the Louisiana State Racing Commission are investigating the performance of the horse Cleaning House in Delta's ninth race on Jan. 23.

The ninth race was one of two trials for the $30,000 Graduation Futurity, the final of which is scheduled for Feb. 15. The Futurity is open only to horses who were maidens as of Jan. 1, and the top five finishers in each trial qualified for the final. Cleaning House, who is trained by Steve Asmussen and was ridden by Donnie Meche, was the heavy favorite at 2-5, but finished third.

ARCADIA, Calif. - A proposal that would feature concurrent racing at two Southern California racetracks on a Sunday in September is expected to be submitted to the California Horse Racing Board later this month.

The Oak Tree Racing Association, which runs a fall meeting at Santa Anita, would like to open its meeting on Sunday, Sept. 28, three days before its scheduled opening on Wednesday, Oct. 1.

HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. - The finish of Friday's eighth race at Gulfstream Park couldn't have come out any better if it had been scripted. Kentucky Derby hopefuls Ten Cents a Shine and Senor Swinger wound up dead-heating for first place in their 3-year-old debuts under entry-level allowance conditions.