While it is tough for a filly to beat males at route distances on dirt or turf, when it comes to sprinting, fast fillies can more than hold their own. Very Subtle, Desert Stormer, and Safely Kept all won editions of the Breeders' Cup Sprint, and Xtra Heat, Meafara, and Pine Tree Lane all came close.

No one will confuse My Girl Lisa with any of the aforementioned fillies, but bettors shouldn't ignore her when she faces 10 males in the $40,000 Crafty Drone, a five-furlong turf stakes at Hawthorne Race Course in Stickney, Ill., on Saturday.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Trainer Vito Armata's career-best year just keeps getting better.

Armata, 53, has been training since 1982 and enjoyed the biggest day of his career when T.J.'s Lucky Moon upset the $1 million Queen's Plate at Woodbine on June 23.

Armata entered this week with 47 winners here this year, a lifetime best for the trainer and good for fifth place in the standings.

He added one win to that total Wednesday night, when Acting Deputy captured a first-level allowance race, and another Thursday when Ocean's Top Gun won his maiden in the second race.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - Earlier this year, Shelby Madison and Lady Vye were being pointed to bigger races than Saturday's Fall Fashion. But their accomplishments have fallen short of their connections' expectations, and as a result the fillies find themselves in the Fall Fashion, which is for 3-year-old fillies who haven't won a stakes worth $20,000 or more in 2002.

PORTLAND, Ore. - For the past 14 years, Bill and Geraldine Johnson have been living with a ghost. It's not as if they didn't ask for it, though.

Gerry Johnson explains: "We bought a mare called Ben's Bunny, and we bred her to a gray stallion named No Back Talk because we wanted a gray foal. When she was in foal I used to rub her belly and ask, 'Have you got a ghost in there?'

"Well, sure enough, she had a gray filly, and when Bill came back from the barn to tell me about it, he said: 'We've got a ghost.' So that was what we named her."

ANDERSON, Ind. - Saturday's $100,000 Michael G. Schaefer Mile drew a field of 10 older runners that may prove to be the deepest in the race's three-year history.

X Country rates a slight edge off his strong second to Tenpins in the Grade 3 Fayette Handicap at Keeneland last month. Before that he captured the Fall Handicap at Mountaineer for his third win of the year. Jeff Johnston will be in to ride X Country, trained by Jack Fuchs.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. - Saarland, away from the races since injuring himself in the Kentucky Derby, is scheduled to make his return to the races in a Friday allowance race at Aqueduct.

Saarland is part of an entry with Easing Along, and trainer Shug McGaughey has named John Velazquez on both horses, meaning one must scratch. McGaughey said he would run Saarland provided "everything is in order."

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - The new Churchill Downs Inc. policy that shuts down betting on the company's races with zero minutes to post appeared to have little impact on racing fans when implemented for the first time Wednesday.

Officials and fans at Churchill Downs said that because the new policy was so well publicized and announced so often, it was difficult to miss, and no major problems were reported at offtrack sites.

"There haven't been any problems," mutuel clerk Terri Smith said after several races at Churchill. "If you don't know about it by now, it's your own fault."

PORTLAND, Ore. - Be Still My Heart will attempt to get back on the winning track when she shoots for her third score in her last four starts in Friday's best race at Portland Meadows, a six-furlong race for 3-year-old Oregon-bred fillies eligible to be claimed for $8,000.

You would have needed the hindsight of the pick-six schemers to have had Thunderello on your ticket in last month's Breeders' Cup Sprint. Or, just the confidence of trainer Scott Lake.

Thunderello, a 48-1 shot, nearly pulled off the biggest upset in Sprint history when he outfooted some of the fastest horses in the world, only to be caught in deep stretch by favored Orientate, who won the $1 million Sprint by a half-length.

MIAMI - If the horsemen's response was any indication, Saturday's first annual Florida Million Day may be the last.

Only 56 horses were entered Wednesday for the six stakes on the inaugural Florida Million program, including only six runners in the main event, the $200,000 Carl G. Rose Classic.