WINNIPEG, Manitoba - With over 700 horses currently stabled on the Assiniboia Downs backstretch and an influx of new trainers and jockeys, an across-the-board purse increase has had the desired effect for the Manitoba Jockey Club as the 2002 season begins Sunday with an eight-race card.

This year's bottom purse of $6,000 is an increase of $1,000 since last year. Non-conditioned allowance races will carry a purse of $16,000, compared to $12,000 last year, while all stakes races that carried purses of $27,500 in 2001 now will be worth $30,000.

FORT ERIE, Ontario - Francine Villeneuve scored two wins on opening day at Fort Erie last Saturday and one on Sunday, which was enough to gain her a share of first place in the standings with three other riders heading into the second weekend of the meeting.

It also earned Villeneuve the distinction of becoming the winningest female jockey in Canada. She now has 600 wins, one more than Regina Sealock, who also is a member of the Fort Erie colony. Sealock finished fifth on her only mount of the opening three-day week.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Twenty-five years after winning his first Kentucky Oaks at age 22, veteran jockey Chris McCarron captured the filly classic for the third time Friday when Farda Amiga ran down favored Take Charge Lady to post a 20-1 upset at Churchill Downs.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Buddha, the Wood Memorial winner who would have been one of the favorites in Saturday's Kentucky Derby, was scratched from the race Friday morning due to lameness in his left foreleg.

The exact nature of the injury was not known, but it is believed to be a soft-tissue injury of the foot or ankle. It is not believed to be a fracture, according to Dr. Larry Bramlage, the on-call veterinarian from the American Association of Equine Practitioners.

The imperfections of Harlan's Holiday are obvious. He has not run particularly fast this spring, he has been beating the same horse, and a mediocre workout Tuesday fueled speculation the favorite is vulnerable. So be it.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Imagine if the ninth race on Saturday at Churchill Downs were just any old race. Imagine if there were a horse who had won six times and finished second four times in 10 races, had won his last two starts, both key prep races, by a combined eight lengths, and had the benefit of two previous races at Churchill Downs, in which he ran first and second.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - A day after the Team Valor syndicate learned that their Windward Passage was being excluded from the Kentucky Derby due to the late entry of the Bob Baffert-trained Danthebluegrassman, they found a minor consolation.

In Thursday's $112,600 La Troienne Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at Churchill Downs, Cashier's Dream, owned by Team Valor and Bill Heiligbrodt, outfinished the Baffert-trained Shameful after a thrilling stretch run.

"We needed something good to happen," said Team Valor president Barry Irwin.

Business was down marginally at the 16-day spring meet that ended April 26 at Keeneland Race Course.

Aggregate all-sources handle set an all-time high, but the average daily handle of $8,478,506 was 2 percent below last spring, when 15 programs were conducted.

Likewise, aggregate ontrack attendance exceeded last spring's, but the average of 14,222 was down 3 percent.

Ontrack handle, which includes imported simulcasts, narrowly exceeded last spring's record average by going just over $1.7 million daily.

CALGARY, Alberta - Saturday's $40,000 Stampede Park Sprint Championship promises to be a competitive race, and a case can be made for each of the six entrants in the six-furlong handicap.

Timely Ruckus, winner of three of the past five Sprint Championships, comes of a poor showing in the prep, which was won by Tyko Tycoon.

Trainer Ernie Keller made no excuses for Timely Ruckus following his fifth-place effort in the prep, and readied his charge with a bullet three-furlong blowout of 35.20 May 1.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - There are three stakes winners in Saturday's Hastings Park feature, an allowance race for 3-year-old fillies, but Classy Action, an optional claiming winner on opening day, could be the favorite.

Classic Action has raced only three times but she dominated a field of straight maidens last September and followed that up with a strong showing in her first start as a 3-year-old. Dave Forster trains Classic Action, a Kentucky-bred daughter of Mighty Action, and Frank Fuentes rides.